itmtittiMWitmiiMmmii*u*Miv>m 


A  BOYS'  LIFE  OF 

BOOKER 
WASHINGT 


JACKSON 


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A  BOYS1  LIFE  OF 
BOOKER  T.  WASHINGTON 


Symbolic  Group  Erected  at  Tuskegee  Institute  (1922), 


A  BOYS'  LIFE 

OF 

BOOKER  T.  WASHINGTON 


BY 
W.  C.  JACKSON 

Vice  President  of  the  North  Carolina  College  for  Women, 
Greensboro,  and  Professor  of  History 


NEW  YORK 

THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 
1922 

All  rights  reserved 


PRINTED   IN   THE   UNITED    STATES  OF   AMERICA 


Copyright,  1922, 
By   THE  MACMILLAN   COMPANY 


Set  up  and  eledfcrotyped.     Published  June,  1922 


PREFACE 

The  single  aim  in  telling  the  story  that  follows  is 
to  interest  boys  in  the  life  of  Booker  T.  Washington. 

This  man's  life  was  of  such  singular  and  vital 
importance  in  the  history  of  his  own  race  and  in 
the  history  of  our  country  that  it  ought  to  be 
familiar  to  all  the  youth  of  the  land,  and  to  the 
negro  youth  especially,  since  it  is  the  greatest 
inspiration  to  the  latter  to  be  found  in  the  annals 
of  American  history. 

There  has  been  no  attempt  to  be  original  or 
exhaustive  in  the  treatment.  While  a  great  mass 
of  material  has  been  consulted,  it  should  be  frankly 
stated  that  the  story  follows  very  closely  the 
material  found  in  Washington's  "Up  from  Slav- 
ery" and  "My  Larger  Education"  and  Scott  and 
Stowe's  "Booker  T.  Washington:  Builder  of  a 
Civilization." 

The  author  desires  to  acknowledge  his  indebted- 
ness to  Doubleday,  Page  and  Company  for  permis- 
sion to  use  extensive  quotations  from  these  books. 

If  some  boy  by  reading  this  book  is  inspired  to 
higher  ambition  and  encouraged  to  nobler  effort, 
the  author  will  feel  that  the  book  is  fully  justified. 


FOREWORD 

This  is  the  story  of  Booker  T.  Washington. 
It  is  the  story  of  a  boy  who  was  born  a  slave  and 
who  in  manhood  became  the  leader  of  ten  million 
people;  who  was  born  in  poverty  and  ignorance 
and  became  the  greatest  orator  and  teacher  of 
the  negro  race;  who  was  born  of  an  ignorant  and 
backward  race  and  became  the  friend  of  the 
greatest  and  best  men  of  all  races  of  all  the  world. 

He  was  a  brave  man.  He  had  courage  and 
backbone.  He  was  not  afraid.  He  had  courage 
to  fight  for  what  he  believed  to  be  the  right. 

He  was  an  energetic  man.  There  was  not  a  lazy 
bone  in  him.  No  man  ever  lived  a  more  strenuous 
life  than  he  did.  He  loved  his  work;  and  few 
other  men  ever  did  so  much  work  in  a  lifetime. 

He  was  just  and  fair-minded.  He  could  see  right 
for  the  white  man  as  well  as  for  the  negro.  He 
never  intentionally  did  any  one,  white  or  black, 
an  injustice. 

He  was  an  honest  man;  honest  in  his  thinking 
as  well  as  in  his  business;  honest,  frank,  and  open 
in  his  speeches  and  his  writings.  He  looked  facts 
squarely  in  the  face. 

He  was  a  wise  man.  He  had  intelligence.  He 
had  good  judgment.  He  knew  the  right  thing  to 
do  and  to  say,  and  he  did  it  and  said  it. 

vii 


viii  FOREWORD 

He  was  a  modest  man.  He  did  not  boast  or 
brag.  He  did  not  try  to  get  money  or  office  or 
high  position.  He  was  content  to  do  his  work  as 
an  honest  man. 

He  was  a  patriotic  man.  He  loved  his  country  and 
believed  this  to  be  the  greatest  nation  in  the  world ; 
and  he  was  ready  to  give  his  life  for  it  if  necessary. 

He  had  will  power.  He  made  up  his  mind  about 
things,  and,  when  he  had  made  a  decision,  he  could 
not  be  discouraged  nor  turned  aside.  He  would 
see  his  plans  through,  and  he  would  stand  by  his 
convictions  to  the  last. 

He  had  self-control.  He  did  not  lose  his  temper 
or  his  tongue.  He  kept  himself  in  hand.  He  did 
not  lose  his  head  or  waste  his  time  and  thought 
and  effort  on  useless  and  needless  things. 

He  was  a  great  lover  of  animals.  He  loved  the 
pigs  and  the  chickens,  the  horses  and  the  dogs,  the 
birds  and  the  fishes,  and  every  living  thing. 

Above  all  he  loved  folks.  He  loved  the  people 
of  all  races.  He  was  a  friend  not  only  to  the  black 
man  but  likewise  a  friend  to  the  red  man,  the  yel- 
low, the  brown,  and  the  white. 

He  loved  his  race.  He  was  not  ashamed  of  it. 
He  was  proud  of  its  history;  of  its  great  achieve- 
ments in  the  past.  He  had  an  abounding  con- 
fidence in  its  future.  He  believed  that  in  the  days 
that  lie  ahead  the  negro  race  is  to  play  a  wonder- 
ful part. 

It  is  well  worth  while  to  know  about  this  man. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.     Early  Childhood i 

II.     Boyhood  Days 9 

III.  Planning  for  an  Education 14 

IV.  School  Days  at  Hampton 22 

V.  Beginning  Life  in  the  Outside  World      .  33 

VI.     Back  at  Hampton 40 

VII.     Building  a  Great  School 45 

VIII.     Strenuous  Days .  56 

IX.  Raising  Money  for  Tuskegee     ....  67 

X.     Making  Speeches 76 

XI.  Success  as  Educational  Leader  ....  88 

XII.     Leading  His  People 105 

XIII.  Political  Experiences 112 

XIV.  Visits  to  Europe 118 

XV.  Booker  T.  Washington:     The  Man      .      -  129 


IX 


LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

Symbolic  Group  Erected  at  Tuskegee  Institute 

(1922) Frontispiece 

Founder's  Day  Drill  at  Tuskegee 6 

Cabinetmaking  at  Tuskegee 23 

Booker  T.  Washington  as  a  Hampton  Graduate 

(1875)  ..." 24 

Booker  T.  Washington's  Class  (1875)  AT  Hampton 

Institute 31 

Tuskegee's  First  Group  of  Buildings    ....  51 

A  Sunday  Afternoon  Band  Concert  on  the  Campus  58 

Automobile  and  Buggy  Trimming  at  Tuskegee  .      .  61 

Class  in  Physical  Training  at  Tuskegee    ...  65 
White    Hall;     Chapel;     Tatum    Hall,    Tuskegee 

Institute 69 

John  A.   Andrew  Memorial  Hospital,   Tuskegee 

Institute 72 

Class  in  Photography,  Tuskegee  Institute     .      .  74 
Chemistry    Class,    Tuskegee    Academic    Depart- 
ment      89 

Truck  Gardening,  Tuskegee  Institute        ...  92 

Domestic  Science  Class  at  Tuskegee     ....  95 

X 


LIST  OF   ILLUSTRATIONS  xi 

PAGE 

The  Students'  Band  of  a  Rural  School     ...  99 
Tailoring  Division,  Tuskegee  Institute      .      .      .  101 
Booker  T.  Washington,  First  Principal  of  Tuske- 
gee Institute 119 

Booker  T.  Washington  and  His  Family      .      .      .  132 
Robert  Russa  Moton,   Successor  to  Booker  T. 

Washington  at  Tuskegee 139 

Booker  T.Washington  and  His  Grandchildren  .  141 


A  BOYS'  LIFE  OF 
BOOKER  T.  WASHINGTON 

CHAPTER  I 

EARLY   CHILDHOOD 

No  state  in  the  Union  has  a  more  interesting 
history  than  Virginia.  It  is  the  oldest  of  the 
states.  It  was  at  Jamestown  in  1607  that  the 
first  permanent  English  settlement  was  made  in 
America.  Before  the  Revolution,  it  shared  with 
Massachusetts  the  honor  of  being  the  leading 
colony.  During  the  time  of  the  Revolution,  it 
furnished  some  of  America's  greatest  leaders  — 
Washington,  Patrick  Henry,  and  Thomas  Jefferson. 
After  the  Revolution,  it  became  known  as  the 
"  Mother  of  Presidents."  Most  of  the  battles  of 
the  Civil  War  were  fought  on  its  soil,  and  its  capital 
was  the  capital  of  the  Confederacy.  Lee  and 
Jackson,  the  two  greatest  leaders  of  the  Confed- 
eracy, were  Virginians. 

It  was  in  this  state  that  slavery  in  North  America 
began.  We  must  remember,  however,  that  slavery 
had  been  in  existence  a  long,  long  time.  The 
ancient  Hebrews,  we  are  told  in  the  Old  Testament, 
practiced  this  evil  custom.     So  did  all  the  nations 


2  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

about  Palestine.  The  Greeks  and  the  Romans 
also  kept  slaves.  We  must  not  think  of  the 
people  that  were  enslaved  by  the  Hebrews  and 
Greeks  and  Romans  as  negroes.  They  were  of  all 
races.  Whenever  one  people  conquered  another, 
it  mattered  not  of  what  race,  the  conquerors  made 
their  captives  slaves.  This  often  resulted  in  the 
most  cultured  and  highly  educated  people  being 
made  slaves.  This  was  especially  the  case  when 
the  Romans  captured  Greeks. 

Later  on  in  the  history  of  Europe,  during  the 
sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries,  the  enslave- 
ment of  negroes  became  very  general,  so  that, 
by  the  time  North  America  began  to  be  settled 
by  the  people  from  Europe,  negro  slaves  were 
bought  and  sold  throughout  the  principal  European 
countries  and  their  colonies. 

So  it  came  about  that,  in  Virginia,  negro  slavery 
was  introduced  into  the  United  States.  It  was  in 
1 619  that  a  Dutch  ship,  after  a  cruise  in  the  West 
Indies,  landed  at  Jamestown,  and  while  there, 
engaging  in  trade  with  the  inhabitants,  sold  them 
nineteen  negroes.  These  were  the  first  slaves  sold 
in  North  America,  and  it  was  from  this  beginning 
that  the  system  grew  up  in  the  country. 

In  Virginia  too  we  had  the  first  big  plantations. 
Tobacco  was  the  most  important  crop  in  the  early 
history  of  the  colony.  The  planters  could  sell 
tobacco  at  a  great  profit  in  England.  Negro 
slaves  could  cultivate  tobacco  very  successfully. 


EARLY   CHILDHOOD  3 

The  planters,  therefore,  bought  slaves  to  raise 
tobacco,  and  they  sold  the  tobacco  and  bought 
more  slaves  to  raise  more  tobacco.  The  planters 
bought  many  hundreds  of  acres  of  land  and  many 
slaves  to  cultivate  them.  As  you  know,  the  slaves 
lived  in  cabins.  These  cabins  were  little  houses, 
usually  built  of  logs,  and  the  cracks  were  daubed 
with  mud.  The  cabin  usually  had  one  door,  one 
window,  and  a  dirt  floor  only.  These  cabins  were 
all  close  together,  not  very  far  from  the  "big 
house,"  and  were  known  as  the  "quarters." 

The  slaves  did  all  the  work  on  the  plantation. 
Most  of  them  worked  in  the  fields.  Some  worked 
about  the  barn  and  in  the  garden.  One  drove  the 
master's  carriage  and  took  care  of  the  horses. 
Another  was  the  butler  in  the  "big  house. "  Some 
of  the  small  boys  and  girls  also  worked  in  the 
"big  house,"  serving  their  young  masters  and 
mistresses.  And,  of  course,  one  of  the  negro  women 
was  the  plantation  cook. 

On  just  such  a  plantation  down  in  Franklin 
County,  Virginia,  Booker  T.  Washington  was 
born.  His  mother  was  the  cook  on  the  plantation 
of  a  Mr.  Burroughs  who  lived  near  a  little  cross- 
roads post  office,  southwest  of  Lynchburg,  called 
Hales'  Ford.  There,  in  a  little  one-room  cabin, 
Booker  was  born  on  April  5,  1856.  The  cabin 
had  no  glass  windows.  It  had  only  one  door, 
and  it  had  a  dirt  floor.  There  were  large  cracks 
that  let  in  the  cold.     In  the   middle  of  the  floor 


4  BOOKER  T.   WASHINGTON 

there  was  a  large  opening  in  the  ground  in  which 
sweet  potatoes  were  stored.  Sometimes  as  they 
put  the  potatoes  in  or  took  them  out,  Booker  got 
one  or  two  and  roasted  them.  All  of  the  cooking 
was  done  over  the  open  fire  in  this  cabin,  for  they 
had  no  stove.  It  was  a  very  uncomfortable  place 
in  which  to  live. 

The  boy  lived  a  hard  life.  He  says:  "I  cannot 
remember  a  single  instance  during  my  childhood 
or  early  boyhood  when  our  entire  family  sat  down 
to  the  table  together,  and  God's  blessing  was  asked, 
and  the  family  ate  a  meal  in  a  civilized  manner. 
It  was  a  piece  of  bread  here,  and  a  scrap  of  meat 
there.  It  was  a  cup  of  milk  at  one  time  and  some 
potatoes  at  another."1 

'  One  day,  when  he  was  about  five  years  old,  he 
saw  his  young  mistress  and  some  visitors  out  in 
the  yard  eating  ginger  cakes.  He  said  he  never 
saw  anything  in  his  life  that  looked  so  good  to  him 
as  those  cakes  did;  and  he  thought  that,  if  he  ever 
got  free,  the  height  of  his  ambition  would  be  to 
buy  all  the  ginger  cakes  he  wanted,  just  like  those 
the  young  ladies  were  eating. 

He  had  to  sleep  on  a  pallet.  He  never  slept 
in  a  bed  until  after  he  was  set  free.  The  first  pair 
of  shoes  he  ever  had  was  made  of  leather,  but  the 
soles  were  of  wood,  and  they  were  very  uncom- 
fortable and  made  a  great  noise  when  he  walked. 
He  never  thought  of  wearing  anything  on  his  head. 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  p.  9. 


EARLY   CHILDHOOD  5 

But  the  worst  thing  about  his  dress  in  those  early 
days  was  having  to  wear  a  flax  shirt.  These  shirts 
were  made  of  the  roughest  and  coarsest  part  of  the 
flax,  and  they  were  very  uncomfortable.  When 
new,  they  scratched  severely.  After  they  were 
worn  awhile  and  "broken  in,"  they  were  fairly 
comfortable.  His  brother  John  often  "broke  in" 
Booker's  shirts  for  him,  a  very  kind  and  generous 
thing  to  do. 

He  had  no  time  to  play  when  he  was  a  boy. 
When  he  was  a  grown  man,  he  was  asked  what 
games  he  played  when  he  was  a  boy,  and  he 
answered  that  he  had  never  played  at  all.  He  had 
to  work  so  hard  that  no  time  was  left  for  play. 
Even  when  he  was  a  very  small  boy,  he  had  to 
sweep  the  yards,  carry  water  to  the  hands  in  the 
fields,  help  around  the  "big  house,"  and  carry  in 
wood.  Going  to  mill  was  the  worst  job  he  had. 
A  farm  hand  would  put  a  sack  of  corn  on  a  horse, 
put  him  on  top  of  the  sack,  and  send  him  off.  Ic 
was  a  long  way  to  the  mill.  Almost  every  time 
he  was  sent,  the  sack  of  corn  would  work  to  one 
side  and  then  fall  off.  It  was  too  heavy  for  him  to 
put  back;  so  he  would  have  to  wait  until  some 
one  came  along  to  help  him.  He  sat  and  cried  until 
some  one  came.  It  was  often  dark  when  he  got 
home.  He  was  terribly  frightened  when  he  was 
alone  at  night,  for  he  was  told  that  there  were 
deserting  soldiers  in  the  woods,  and  that  when 
they  found  little  negro  boys  the  first  thing  they 


6  BOOKER  T.   WASHINGTON 

would  do  would  be  to  cut  off  their  ears.     Of  course 
this  was  not  true,  but  he  thought  it  was. 

Do  you  suppose  this  little  boy  had  any  chance 
to  go  to  school?  This  is  what  he  says:  "I  had  no 
schooling  whatever  while  I  was  a  slave,  though  I 
remember  on  several  occasions  I  went  as  far  as 
the  schoolhouse  door  with  one  of  my  young  mis- 


Founder's  Day  Drill  at  Tuskegee 

tresses  to  carry  her  books.  The  picture  of  several 
boys  and  girls  in  a  schoolroom  engaged  in  study 
made  a  deep  impression  upon  me,  and  I  had  the 
feeling  that  to  get  into  a  schoolhouse  and  study 
in  this  way  would  be  about  the  same  as  getting 
into  paradise."  1  This  is  the  same  boy  who  came 
to  be  the  greatest  educator  of  his  race;  the  head 
of  the  greatest  negro  school  in  the  world. 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  pp.  6-7. 


EARLY   CHILDHOOD  7 

It  must  be  remembered  that  the  conditions 
under  which  Booker  lived  in  these  early  years  of 
his  life  were  not  restricted  entirely  to  the  negroes. 
Many  of  the  white  people  were  poor  also,  and  many 
white  boys  wore  flax  shirts  and  shoes  with  wooden 
soles.  Just  after  the  Civil  War,  especially,  all 
the  white  people  of  the  South  had  a  very  hard  time. 
White  boys  as  well  as  negro  boys  had  no  time  for 
play.  Nor  did  they  have  an  opportunity  to  go  to 
school.  In  those  days  many  white  boys  who  were 
eager  for  an  education  had  such  difficulties  to  face 
as  those  which  loomed  up  before  Booker  Wash- 
ington. 

By  and  by,  when  Booker  was  about  nine  years 
of  age,  there  came  a  thrilling  day.  For  four  long 
years  the  great  war  had  been  going  on.  Often  he 
had  heard  his  mother  singing  freedom  songs.  He 
remembered  being  awakened  one  morning  and 
saw  his  mother  by  his  bed  and  heard  her  praying 
that  Lincoln  might  be  successful,  and  that  her 
little  boy  might  some  day  be  free.  He  had  seen 
some  of  the  soldiers  in  their  uniforms,  home  on 
furlough.  He  remembered  when  they  brought 
home  the  body  of  "Marse  Billy"  and  buried  him 
amidst  the  bitter  weeping  of  the  slaves,  who  loved 
him  as  their  friend,  for  he  had  often  begged  for 
them  when  they  were  about  to  be  punished.  While 
they  vaguely  knew  and  felt  that  the  success  of 
Lincoln  meant  freedom,  and  the  success  of  the 
others  meant  slavery,   they  were  still  loyal  and 


8  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

true  to  their  masters.  By  means  of  the  "  grape 
vine  telegraph,"  that  is,  by  passing  news  along 
quickly  from  one  plantation  to  another,  the  slaves 
had  kept  pretty  well  informed  of  the  progress  of 
the  war,  and  when  Lee  surrendered  at  Appomat- 
tox, the  slaves  knew  it  very  soon. 

One  night  word  came  to  the  "quarters"  that 
something  very  unusual  would  happen  at  the  ' '  big 
house"  the  next  day.  There  was  much  excite- 
ment. Nobody  slept  that  night.  Early  next 
morning  some  one  came  to  the  quarters  and  told 
the  negroes  that  they  were  all  wanted  at  the  house. 
Booker's  mother  called  her  children,  and  they  with 
all  the  other  slaves  marched  up  to  the  house.  All 
the  members  of  the  family  were  on  the  porch. 
They  were  very  quiet  and  seemed  sad  and  de- 
pressed. There  was  present  a  stranger,  a  man  who 
wore  a  uniform.  He  stood  up  and  read  a  paper  — 
'The  Emancipation  Proclamation."  Then  the 
master  explained  that  the  negroes  were  now  free. 
He  told  them  that  they  could  go  wherever  they 
desired.  He  also  told  them  that  they  could  live 
where  they  were  if  they  wanted  to,  and  they  would 
be  taken  care  of;  but  if  they  preferred,  they  could 
go  to  any  other  place.  Booker's  mother  leaned 
over  her  children  and  kissed  them  while  the  tears 
streamed  down  her  face.  Her  prayers  had  been 
answered.    Her  children  were  free, 


CHAPTER  II 

BOYHOOD   DAYS 

When  the  slaves  were  set  free,  one  of  the  first 
things  that  many  of  them  did  was  to  change  their 
names.  Most  of  the  slaves  had  only  one  name. 
As  free  people  they  felt  that  they  should  have  the 
same  sort  of  names  as  other  free  people;  so  they 
began  to  add  a  last  name,  and  usually  an  initial. 
If  a  man  had  been  called  "Tom"  all  his  life,  he 
was  now  called  "Tom  L.  Johnson."  The  "L" 
stood  for  nothing.  It  was  simply  a  part  of  his 
"entitles,"  as  Washington  says.  Another  thing 
they  did  was  to  leave  their  old  home  place.  They 
could  not  realize  that  they  were  really  free  unless 
they  tested  the  matter  by  going  away  from  the 
place  of  their  servitude. 

Booker  Washington's  stepfather  had  left  Vir- 
ginia during  the  war  and  had  gone  to  West  Vir- 
ginia. Just  as  soon  as  the  war  was  over,  he  sent 
for  his  wife  and  children  to  come  to  him  in  West 
Virginia. 

He  lived  at  Maiden,  five  miles  from  Charleston, 
the  capital  of  the  state.  It  was  several  hundred 
miles  from  the  old  home  in  Virginia,  but  the 
family  determined  to  go.  They  bundled  up  their 
goods  and  put  them  in  a  cart,  the  children  walking. 
They  traveled   the   entire  distance  in  this  way. 

9 


io  BOOKER  T.   WASHINGTON 

They  would  stop  by  the  roadside  to  do  their  cook- 
ing and  to  camp  at  night. 

One  night  they  stopped  near  an  empty  cabin. 
They  decided  to  spend  the  night  in  the  cabin. 
They  went  in  and  built  a  fire  and  spread  a  pallet 
on  the  floor.  Suddenly  a  big  black  snake  rolled 
down  out  of  the  chimney  and  on  to  the  pallet. 
You  can  imagine  that  they  did  not  care  to  stay 
longer  in  that  house.  They  got  outside  at  once 
and  made  a  camp. 

After  several  weeks,  they  completed  their  jour- 
ney, and  the  family  reached  the  town  of  Maiden. 
Salt  was  mined  there,  and  Booker's  stepfather 
worked  in  the  salt  furnaces.  Small  as  he  was, 
Booker  had  to  begin  this  work  too.  It  was  very 
hard  work,  and  it  was  terrible  that  this  child 
should  be  compelled  to  do  it.  But  it  was  just  like 
Booker  to  turn  the  situation  to  an  advantage. 
The  first  thing  he  ever  did  in  the  way  of  reading 
was  to  learn  the  figure  "  18,"  which  was  the  num- 
ber put  on  the  barrels  of  salt  made  by  his  father. 
Booker  was  anxious  to  learn  to  read;  but  he  had 
no  one  to  teach  him.  His  own  mother  could  not 
even  teach  him  his  letters.  She  bought  him  an 
old  Webster's  u blue-back"  speller,  and  he  began 
his  first  study  in  this  book. 

About  this  time  a  private  school  was  established 
in  the  community.  Booker  was  greatly  excited 
over  this,  for  he  had  an  overwhelming  desire  to  go 
to  school.     He  was  a  good  worker,  however,  and 


BOYHOOD   DAYS  n 

was  earning  money;  so  his  father  said  "no,"  and 
he  could  not  go.  Booker  was  terribly  disappointed. 
He  went  on  with  his  work  with  a  heavy  heart, 
but  he  never  missed  a  chance  to  urge  his  step- 
father to  let  him  go  to  school.  Finally,  his  father 
agreed  to  let  him  go  for  a  part  of  the  day,  pro- 
vided he  would  get  up  early  each  morning  and  work 
until  nine  o'clock  and  then  work  two  hours  after 
school  was  out. 

It  was  a  glorious  day  for  him  when  he  found 
himself  going  to  school.  However,  he  soon  en- 
countered two  great  difficulties.  One  was  that  he 
did  not  have  a  hat.  He  had  never  worn  a  hat  or 
cap  in  his  life.  Since  all  the  other  boys  had  them, 
he  felt  that  he  must  have  one.  So  he  went  home 
and  told  his  mother  about  the  situation.  She 
explained  to  him  that  she  had  no  money  with 
which  to  buy  a  "store"  hat,  but  she  got  two  old 
pieces  of  "homespun"  or  jeans,  and  sewed  them 
together  for  a  cap.  The  next  day  Booker  proudly 
walked  to  school  with  one  difficulty  solved. 

Listen  to  his  own  story  of  his  second  difficulty: 
"My  second  difficulty  was  with  regard  to  my 
name,  or  rather  a  name.  From  the  time  I  could 
remember  anything  I  had  been  called  simply 
'Booker/  Before  going  to  school  it  had  never 
occurred  to  me  that  it  was  needful  or  appropriate 
to  have  an  additional  name. 

"When  I  heard  the  school  roll  called,  I  noticed 
that  all  the  children  had  at  least  two  names,  and 


\2  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

some  of  them  indulged  in  what  seemed  to  me  the 
extravagance  of  having  three.  I  was  in  deep  per- 
plexity, because  I  knew  that  the  teacher  would 
demand  of  me  at  least  two  names,  and  I  had  only 
one.  By  the  time  the  occasion  came  for  the  en- 
rolling of  my  name,  an  idea  occurred  to  me  which 
I  thought  would  make  me  equal  to  the  situation; 
and  so,  when  the  teacher  asked  me  what  my  full 
name  was,  I  calmly  told  him  'Booker  Washing- 
ton,' as  if  I  had  been  called  by  that  name  all  my 
life;    and  by  that  name  I  have  since  been  known. 

u  Later  in  my  life  I  found  that  my  mother  had 
given  me  the  name  of  'Booker  Taliaferro'  (pro- 
nounced Tol-li-ver)  soon  after  I  was  born,  but  in 
some  way  that  part  of  my  name  seemed  to  dis- 
appear, and  for  a  long  while  was  forgotten,  but  as 
soon  as  I  found  out  about  it,  I  revived  it  and  made 
my  full  name  'Booker  Taliaferro  Washington.' 
I  think  there  are  not  many  men  in  our  country 
who  have  had  the  privilege  of  naming  themselves 
in  the  way  that  I  have."  l 

Booker  was  not  permitted  to  go  to  school  very 
long.  His  stepfather  put  him  back  to  work  but  he 
went  to  school  at  night  for  a  while.  Here  he  learned 
how  valuable  the  nighttime  was,  and  he  after- 
wards used  it  a  great  deal  in  teaching  others. 

Near  Maiden  was  a  coal  mine.  This  business 
became  prosperous,  and  Booker  was  sent  to  work 
in  the  coal  mines.    He  hated  this  work  worse  than 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  pp.  34-35. 


BOYHOOD   DAYS  13 

any  he  ever  did.  The  work  was  very  dirty.  It 
was  pitch  dark  in  the  mines.  It  was  also  very 
dangerous,  for  they  used  dynamite  to  blast  out 
the  coal.  His  work  was  a  mile  from  the  entrance 
of  the  mine.  Furthermore,  there  were  many  big 
rats  in  the  place.  Because  there  were  many  large 
chambers  to  the  mine  and  he  never  could  learn  all 
of  them,  he  often  got  lost.  Then  his  light  would 
go  out,  and  sometimes  he  would  have  to  wait  for 
hours  for  some  one  to  come  to  his  aid.  This  was 
terrible  work  for  a  boy  only  ten  or  twelve  years 
of  age. 


CHAPTER   III 

PLANNING    FOR   AN    EDUCATION 

Later  in  life  Washington  said :  "There  was  never 
a  time  in  my  youth,  no  matter  how  dark  and  dis- 
couraging the  days  might  be,  when  one  resolve  did 
not  continually  remain  with  me,  and  that  was  to 
secure  an  education  at  any  cost."  l 

This  was  the  thought  that  was  in  his  mind  as  he 
toiled  from  day  to  day  in  the  dark  and  dirty  coal 
mine.  He  had  never  heard  of  any  school  except 
the  little  one  he  had  attended  for  a  short  time  in 
Maiden.  But  he  was  sure  that  somewhere  and 
in  some  way  he  would  find  a  place  that  would  give 
him  what  he  so  much  desired. 

One  day,  while  digging  away  in  the  mine,  he 
heard  a  miner  say  something  to  another  about  a 
big  school  for  negroes.  He  was  greatly  excited 
and  on  his  hands  and  feet  he  crept  through  the 
dark,  as  close  to  the  two  men  as  he  dared,  and 
listened.  They  kept  on  talking  and  Booker  heard 
a  conversation  something  like  this:  "I  wish  my 
boy  could  go  to  that  school  over  in  Virginia,"  said 
one  miner.  "They  say  it  is  the  best  school  any- 
where in  the  country." 

"What  school  are  you  talking  about?"  said  the 
other. 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  p.  37. 

14 


PLANNING   FOR   AN   EDUCATION     15 

''The  one  at  a  place  called  Hampton,  over  in 
Virginia,"  was  the  reply. 

"Well,  suppose  there  is  a  good  school  there; 
negro  boys  can't  go  to  it,  can  they?"  was  asked. 

"  Yes,  they  can,"  said  the  other.  "It  is  a  school 
just  for  negro  boys  and  girls,  and  they  teach  the 
boys  and  girls  something  besides  books,  too.  They 
are  taught  some  useful  trades  so  that  they  can  go 
out  and  make  a  good  living  and  be  independent 
and  have  pleasant  work  to  do." 

"Well,"  said  the  other  miner,  "that  sounds 
pretty  good,  but  nobody  but  rich  folks  can  afford 
such  a  school  as  that;  so  I  don't  see  where  it  is 
going  to  help  us  any." 

"There  is  where  you  are  mistaken  again,"  was 
the  answer,  "for  poor  boys  and  girls  can  go  to  this 
school.  That  is  what  I  have  heard.  They  say 
that  they  give  the  boys  and  girls  different  kinds 
of  work  to  do,  so  that  they  can  pay  their  own  way 
through  school." 

Booker  heard  no  more.  He  returned  to  his  work 
very  greatly  excited.  That  certainly  was  the  place 
for  him.  He  then  and  there  made  up  his  mind 
that  he  would  go  to  that  school  no  matter  what 
happened.  He  did  not  know  where  the  place  was, 
but  he  determined  that  he  would  find  it.  From 
that  day  on,  one  thought  was  in  his  mind  —  to  go 
to  Hampton. 

He  wanted  to  quit  work  in  the  mines,  because 
the  work  was  so  dangerous,  and  because  he  was 


1 6  BOOKER  T.   WASHINGTON 

not  making  enough  money.  A  few  days  after  he 
heard  the  conversation  about  Hampton,  he  heard 
that  Mrs.  RurTner  wanted  a  servant.  She  was  the 
wife  of  General  Lewis  RurTner,  the  owner  of  the 
salt  furnaces  and  the  coal  mines.  The  lady,  Mrs. 
Viola  RurTner,  was  said  to  be  very  strict  with  her 
servants,  and  consequently  no  servant  would  stay 
with  her  long  at  a  time. 

When  Booker  heard  that  she  was  looking  for 
another  servant,  he  decided  to  apply  for  the 
place.  He  was  terribly  frightened  when  he  went 
into  her  presence;  and  he  was  surprised  to  find 
her  very  kind  and  considerate.  She  employed 
him,  giving  him  five  dollars  a  month.  She  became 
very  fond  of  this  boy,  who  worked  so  hard  and 
so  well  and  tried  to  do  the  work  so  as  to  please 
her.  She  showed  her  interest  in  his  ambition  to 
get  an  education,  by  letting  him  ofT  a  part  of  the 
day  to  study,  and  by  encouraging  him  to  go  to  the 
night  school. 

Washington  says  also  that  he  learned  from  Mrs. 
RurTner  many  valuable  lessons  in  cleanliness, 
promptness,  and  order.  He  says:  "Even  to  this 
day,  I  never  see  bits  of  paper  scattered  around  a 
house  or  in  the  street  that  I  do  not  wTant  to  pick 
them  up  at  once.  I  never  see  a  filthy  yard  that  I 
do  not  want  to  clean  it,  a  paling  off  a  fence  that  I 
do  not  want  to  put  it  on,  an  unpainted  or  un white- 
washed house  that  I  do  not  want  to  paint  or  white- 
wash it;   or  a  button  off  one's  clothes,  or  a  grease 


PLANNING  FOR  AN   EDUCATION     17 

spot  on  them  or  on  a  floor,  that  I  do  not  want  to 
call  attention  to  it."  1 

It  was  while  working  for  Mrs.  Ruffner  that  he 
started  his  first  "library."  He  got  an  old  dry- 
goods  box,  knocked  out  one  side  of  it,  nailed  it  up 
against  the  wall,  arranged  some  shelves,  and  then 
put  into  it  every  book  that  he  could  lay  his  hands 
on. 

But  Booker  was  restless.  He  wanted  to  get 
started  to  school.  He  had  not  saved  much  money, 
for  he  had  not  been  working  for  himself  very  long, 
but  he  determined  to  start  with  what  little  money 
he  had. 

What  did  his  determination  mean?  Look  at 
your  map  and  you  will  see  that  Hampton  is  about 
five-hundred  miles  from  Maiden.  Booker  was  a 
boy  of  sixteen  years.  He  did  not  know  a  soul 
beyond  the  borders  of  his  own  community.  He 
had  but  a  few  dollars.  His  mother  was  not  well, 
and  he  doubted  very  much  whether  he  would  ever 
see  her  alive  again.  But  he  must  go  and  learn,  and 
his  good  mother,  noble  and  brave  as  she  was, 
encouraged  her  boy  and  helped  him  to  get  away. 

All  the  people  in  the  community  were  much 
interested  in  his  going.  While  they  had  never  had 
a  chance,  they  wanted  to  encourage  this  boy  who 
was  so  determined  to  get  an  education.  Some  of 
them  would  give  him  a  nickel,  some  a  quarter, 
and  others  a  handkerchief  to  show  their  desire 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  p.  44. 


1 8  BOOKER  T.   WASHINGTON 

to  help  him.  By  and  by  the  day  for  his  departure 
came.  He  put  his  few  dollars  in  his  pocket,  picked 
up  the  little  satchel  containing  his  few  clothes, 
said  good-by  to  the  neighbors,  kissed  his  weeping 
mother  good-by,  and  turned  his  face  towards 
Hampton. 

There  was  no  through  train  in  those  days,  and 
he  had  to  travel  by  stagecoach  as  well  as  by  train. 
He  had  no  idea,  when  he  started,  how  costly  it 
was  to  travel,  and  he  had  not  gone  far  before  he 
realized  that  he  did  not  have  enough  money  to 
take  him  to  Hampton.  So  he  walked  much  of  the 
way.  He  would  ask  for  a  ride  with  passers-by, 
and  in  this  way  made  fairly  good  progress. 

Early  in  his  journey  he  had  a  new  and  trying 
experience.  He  had  been  riding,  together  with 
a  number  of  white  passengers,  all  day  in  the 
stagecoach.  At  nightfall  they  stopped  at  a  house 
which  was  called  a  hotel,  and  all  the  passengers 
went  in  and  were  given  rooms.  When  Booker 
went  in  and  asked  for  a  room,  he  was  told  that  they 
could  not  take  him,  that  they  did  not  take  negroes. 
He  had  not  intended  to  offend.  He  himself  says 
it  was  simply  the  first  time  that  he  realized  that 
the  color  of  his  skin  made  a  difference.  He  was 
so  intent  upon  getting  to  Hampton,  he  never 
thought  of  getting  angry.  He  simply  walked 
about  all  night,  as  it  was  rather  cold,  and  went  on 
his  journey  next  morning. 

Let  him  tell  his  own  story  of  another  incident 


PLANNING  FOR  AN   EDUCATION     19 

of  this  famous  journey.  "By  walking,"  he  says, 
11  begging  rides  both  in  wagons  and  in  the  cars,  in 
some  way,  after  a  number  of  days,  I  reached  the 
city  of  Richmond,  Va.,  about  eighty-two  miles 
from  Hampton.  When  I  reached  there,  tired, 
hungry,  and  dirty,  it  was  late  in  the  night.  I  had 
never  been  in  a  large  city,  and  this  was  rather  to 
add  to  my  misery.  When  I  reached  Richmond, 
I  was  completely  out  of  money.  I  had  not  a  single 
acquaintance  in  that  place,  and  being  unused  to 
city  ways,  I  did  not  know  where  to  go. 

"I  applied  at  several  places  for  lodging,  but 
they  all  wanted  money,  and  that  was  what  I  did 
not  have.  Knowing  nothing  else  better  to  do  I 
walked  the  streets.  In  doing  so,  I  passed  by  many 
places  and  foodstands  where  fried  chicken  and 
half -moon  apple  pies  were  piled  high  and  made  to 
present  a  most  tempting  appearance.  At  that 
time  it  seemed  to  me  that  I  would  have  promised 
all  that  I  expected  to  possess  in  the  future  to  have 
gotten  hold  of  one  of  those  chicken  legs  or  one  of 
those  pies.  But  I  could  not  get  either  of  these, 
nor  anything  else  to  eat. 

"I  must  have  walked  till  after  midnight.  At 
last  I  became  exhausted  and  I  could  walk  no 
longer.  I  was  tired.  I  was  hungry.  I  was  every- 
thing but  discouraged.  Just  about  the  time  when 
I  reached  extreme  physical  exhaustion,  I  came 
upon  a  portion  of  the  street  where  the  board  side- 
walk was  considerably  elevated.     I  waited  for  a 


20  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

few  minutes,  till  I  was  sure  that  no  passer-by 
could  see  me,  and  then  crept  under  the  sidewalk, 
and  lay  for  the  night  upon  the  ground  with  my 
satchel  for  a  pillow."  l 

When  he  awoke  in  the  morning,  he  found  that 
he  was  near  a  large  ship  which  was  unloading  a 
cargo  of  pig  iron.  He  went  directly  to  the  ship, 
told  the  captain  his  situation,  and  asked  for  work 
in  order  that  he  might  earn  money  with  which  to 
buy  some  food.  The  captain  gave  him  work  and 
was  so  well  pleased  with  him  that  he  gave  him 
employment  for  several  days.  Washington  was 
anxious  to  get  enough  money  to  take  him  to  Hamp- 
ton as  soon  as  possible.  So  in  order  to  save  as 
much  of  his  wages  as  possible,  he  continued  to 
sleep  under  the  sidewalk  where  he  slept  the  first 
night  he  arrived. 

Many  years  after  that,  he  was  given  a  great 
reception  in  Richmond,  at  a  place  near  this  spot, 
and  Washington  says  that  his  mind  was  more 
upon  that  sidewalk  that  night  than  it  was  upon  the 
great  reception  given  him  by  the  two  thousand 
people  present. 

After  a  few  days  of  work  in  unloading  the  ves- 
sel, he  felt  that  he  had  enough  money  to  take  him 
to  Hampton;  so  he  continued  his  journey.  Several 
days  later  he  reached  Hampton,  with  just  exactly 
fifty  cents. 

What  a  wonderful  journey  it  had  been!     And 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  pp.  48-49. 


PLANNING  FOR  AN   EDUCATION     21 

now  at  its  end,  as  the  big  buildings  of  the  school 
came  into  view,  he  had  a  thrill  that  more  than 
repaid  him  for  all  the  hardships  of  his  trip.  He 
was  supremely  happy,  for  he  had  reached  the  end 
of  his  rainbow  and  had  found  his  great  treasure. 


CHAPTER   IV 

SCHOOL   DAYS   AT   HAMPTON 

At  the  close  of  the  Civil  War  one  of  the  most 
important  needs  of  the  country  was  to  provide 
some  kind  of  education  for  the  negroes.  They 
had  never  had  any  schools.  If  they  were  to  be- 
come good  citizens,  they  must  have  the  proper 
training.  A  great  many  good  men  in  the  North 
and  in  the  South  recognized  this  fact,  and  set  to 
work  to  establish  schools.  Among  these  men  was 
General  Samuel  C.  Armstrong.  The  General's 
parents  had  been  missionaries  to  Hawaii.  He  had 
been  educated  in  the  United  States,  had  entered 
the  army  as  soon  as  the  war  began,  and  had  made 
such  a  brilliant  record  as  a  soldier  that,  when  the 
war  wTas  over,  he  had  risen  to  the  rank  of  general. 

He  had  seen  a  great  deal  of  the  negro  as  a  soldier 
during  the  war.  He  knew  about  the  conditions  in 
the  South,  and  he  felt  that  the  greatest  service  he 
could  render  would  be  to  give  his  life  to  the  cause 
of  education.  He  went  to  work  at  once,  and, 
through  the  aid  of  a  number  of  Southern  men,  he 
established  a  school  for  negro  boys  and  girls  at 
Hampton,  Virginia,  and  called  it  Hampton  Insti- 
tute. 

His  main  purpose  was  to  give  negro  boys  and 


SCHOOL   DAYS  AT  HAMPTON 


23 


girls  an  opportunity  to  learn  some  useful  trade. 
He  believed  that  people  must  first  learn  to  make 
a  good  living  before  they  could  make  much  progress 
in  any  other  direction.  He  wanted  the  negroes 
to  have  good  food  and  good  clothes  and  good 
homes.     He  wanted  them  to  be  able  to  earn  these 


:#'?»» 


-';&- 


Cabinetmaking  at  Tuskegee 

things.  Likewise,  he  wanted  them  to  be  good 
farmers,  good  carpenters,  good  brick  masons, 
good  mechanics,  and  good  workmen  in  all  kinds 
of  trades.  He  wanted  these  trades  taught  in  the 
schools.  Then,  as  the  race  progressed,  he  wished 
to  have  the  higher  branches  of  study  given,  such 
as  Latin,  mathematics,  and  literature. 


24 


BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 


Thus  was  begun  one  of  the  greatest  schools  in 
America.  Every  negro  boy  knows  about  Hamp- 
ton. Thousands  of  the  best  negroes  in  the  country 
were  trained  there.  General  Armstrong  was  presi- 
dent of  the  school  and  did  a  wonderful  work.    He 

seemed  to  inspire 
every  student  who 
entered  to  become 
a  good  and  useful 
citizen.  Too  much 
cannot  be  said  in 
praise  of  him  and 
the  great  school  he 
founded. 

It  was  here  that 
Booker  arrived  in 
the  fall  of  1872, 
with  a  little  satchel 
of  clothes,  fifty  cents 
in  his  pocket,  a 
happy  heart,  and 
a  determination  to 
succeed. 

Just  as  soon  as  he  was  able  to  get  an  interview,  he 
went  to  the  head  teacher,  Mary  F.  Mackie,  and 
told  her  that  he  wanted  to  enter  school.  She 
stared  at  him.  He  was  dirty  after  his  long  and 
hard  journey.  His  clothes  were  soiled.  He  realized 
at  once  that  he  was  making  a  bad  impression,  and 
it  was  not  his  fault.     Miss  Mackie  would  not  say 


Booker  T.  Washington  as  a 
Hampton  Graduate  (1875) 


SCHOOL   DAYS  AT  HAMPTON         25 

whether  she  would  admit  him  or  not.  She  made 
him  wait.  He  was  worried.  All  he  wanted  was 
a  chance  to  show  her  that  he  meant  business. 
Then  a  very  interesting  thing  happened.  Booker 
Washington  tells  the  story  himself.  He  called  it 
his  examination. 

"After  some  time  had  passed,"  he  says,  "the 
head  teacher  said:  'The  adjoining  recitation  room 
needs  sweeping.    Take  the  broom  and  sweep  it.' 

"It  occurred  to  me  at  once  that  here  was  my 
chance.  Never  did  I  receive  an  order  with  more 
delight.  I  knew  that  I  could  sweep,  for  Mrs. 
RufTner  had  thoroughly  taught  me  how  to  do  that 
w7hen  I  lived  with  her. 

"I  swept  the  recitation  room  three  times. 
Then  I  got  a  dusting-cloth  and  I  dusted  it  four 
times.  All  the  woodwork  around  the  walls,  every 
bench,  table,  and  desk,  I  went  over  four  times  with 
my  dusting-cloth.  Besides,  every  piece  of  furni- 
ture had  been  moved  and  every  closet  and  corner 
in  the  room  had  been  thoroughly  cleaned.  I  had 
the  feeling  that  in  a  large  measure  my  future  de- 
pended upon  the  impression  I  made  upon  the 
teacher  in  the  cleaning  of  that  room. 

"When  I  was  through,  I  rapped  on  the  door, 
and  reported  to  the  teacher.  She  was  a  'Yankee' 
woman  who  knew  just  where  to  look  for  dirt. 
She  went  into  the  room  and  inspected  the  floor  and 
closets;  then  she  took  her  handkerchief  and 
rubbed  it  on  the  woodwork  about  the  walls,  and 


26  BOOKER    T.  WASHINGTON 

over  the  table  and  benches.  When  she  was  un- 
able to  find  one  bit  of  dirt  on  the  floor,  or  a  par- 
ticle of  dust  on  any  of  the  furniture,  she  quietly 
remarked,  'I  guess  you  will  do  to  enter  this  in- 
stitution.' 

"I  was  one  of  the  happiest  souls  on  earth.  The 
sweeping  of  that  room  was  my  college  examination, 
and  never  did  any  youth  pass  an  entrance  ex- 
amination into  Harvard  or  Yale  that  gave  him 
more  genuine  satisfaction.  I  have  passed  several 
examinations  since  then,  but  I  have  always  felt 
that  this  one  was  the  best  one  I  ever  passed."  1 

As  a  result  of  his  sweeping  the  room,  he  was  per- 
mitted to  enter  his  classes  and  was  also  given  a 
job  as  janitor,  and  his  college  career  began.  It 
was  a  new,  strange  life.  He  sat  down  at  a  table, 
which  had  a  cloth  on  it,  to  eat  his  meals.  He 
slept  in  a  bed  that  had  sheets  on  it.  These  sheets 
gave  him  trouble.  The  first  night  he  slept  under 
both  of  them.  He  didn't  think  that  was  right,  so 
the  next  night  he  slept  on  top  of  both  of  them. 
The  third  night  he  watched  his  roommates,  — 
there  were  seven  of  them  in  the  same  room,  —  and 
he  saw  how  the  thing  was  done.  After  that,  he 
did  as  the  others  did  and  slept  between  the  sheets. 

"I  sometimes  feel,"  he  says,  "that  almost  the 
most  valuable  lesson  I  got  at  Hampton  Institute 
was  in  the  use  and  value  of  a  bath.  I  learned  there, 
for  the  first  time,  some  of  its  value  was  not  only 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  pp.  52-53. 


SCHOOL   DAYS  AT  HAMPTON         27 

in  keeping  the  body  healthy,  but  in  inspiring  self- 
respect  and  promoting  virtue.  In  all  my  travels 
in  the  South  and  elsewhere  since  leaving  Hampton 
Institute,  I  have  always  in  some  way  sought  my 
daily  bath.  To  get  it  sometimes  when  I  have  been 
the  guest  of  my  own  people  in  a  single-roomed 
cabin  has  not  been  easy  to  do  except  by  slipping 
away  to  some  stream  in  the  woods.  I  have  always 
tried  to  teach  my  people  that  some  provision  for 
bathing  should  be  a  part  of  every  house."  l 

For  some  time  he  had  only  one  pair  of  socks. 
He  had  a  time  of  it  with  these  socks.  When  they 
were  too  soiled  to  wear,  he  would  wash  them  out 
at  night,  hang  them  by  the  fire  and  dry  them 
out,  and  put  them  on  the  next  morning.  He  also 
had  a  hard  time  with  his  clothes.  They  had  in- 
spection every  morning.  The  students  were  lined 
up,  and  General  Armstrong  passed  along  the  lines 
and  carefully  examined  every  one.  If  a  button 
was  off,  or  if  the  clothes  were  torn  or  soiled  in  any 
way,  the  General  would  see  it.  Booker  had  a  hard 
time  keeping  his  clothes  in  such  a  condition  that 
they  would  pass  muster. 

His  work  as  janitor  was  very  hard.  He  often 
had  to  work  late  at  night,  for  he  had  many  rooms 
to  clean.  He  always  got  up  at  four  o'clock  in  the 
morning  to  build  his  fires  and  do  some  of  his  study- 
ing. He  had  a  hard  time  working  and  making 
expenses  too.    He  usually  borrowed  his  books  from 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  p.  58. 


28  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

other  students.  He  soon  got  some  more  clothing 
from  the  barrels  of  clothing  sent  to  the  school  by 
people  from  the  North.  Board  was  ten  dollars  a 
month,  part  of  which  he  could  pay  by  his  work 
as  janitor,  but  a  part  of  it  he  was  supposed  to  pay 
in  cash,  and  he  had  no  cash.  His  work  was  so 
satisfactory,  however,  that  in  a  short  while  he  was 
told  that  his  work  would  pay  all  of  his  board. 
S.  Griffitts  Morgan,  of  New  Bedford,  Massachusetts, 
paid  his  tuition.  At  the  end  of  the  year  he  owed 
the  college  only  sixteen  dollars. 

When  the  college  closed  at  the  end  of  the  term, 
all  the  students  went  home.  Booker  could  not  go. 
It  was  too  far,  and  he  had  no  money.  He  wanted 
to  get  away  and  get  a  job,  so  that  he  could  pay  the 
sixteen  dollars  he  owed.  He  had  an  extra  second- 
hand coat ;  so  he  decided  to  sell  that  to  get  money 
to  go  away  on.  He  cleaned  and  pressed  the  coat, 
and  then  let  it  be  known  that  it  was  for  sale. 
After  a  while  a  man  came  to  see  it.  He  looked  at 
it  and  asked  the  price.  Booker  told  him  three 
dollars.  The  man  said,  "Well,  I  think  I  will  take 
it.  I  will  tell  you  what  I  will  do.  I  will  pay  you 
five  cents  cash,  and  the  rest  as  soon  as  I  can  get 
it,"    How  do  you  suppose  Booker  felt  about  that? 

He  finally  got  a  job  as  a  waiter  in  a  restaurant 
at  Fortress  Monroe.  They  did  not  pay  him  enough 
for  him  to  save  anything.  One  day  when  he  was 
cleaning  up  the  place,  he  found  a  nice,  crisp  ten- 
dollar  bill  under  a  table.     He  was  very  happy. 


SCHOOL   DAYS  AT   HAMPTON         29 

Now  he  could  pay  back  the  money  he  owed  at 
Hampton.  However,  he  thought  he  ought  to  tell 
the  proprietor  about  finding  the  ten  dollars.  He 
did  so,  and  the  proprietor  coolly  took  the  ten-dollar 
bill,  saying  that,  since  the  place  belonged  to  him, 
everything  that  was  found  in  it  naturally  belonged 
to  him. 

After  vacation  was  over,  he  returned  to  Hamp- 
ton and  was  told  that  he  could  have  as  long  to  pay 
the  sixteen  dollars  as  he  wanted,  and  that  he  could 
have  a  job  as  janitor  again.  So,  his  second  year 
passed  much  the  same  as  the  first.  He  devoted 
much  of  his  time  this  year  and  the  next  to  the 
debating  societies.  He  says  that  he  never  missed 
a  single  meeting  while  he  was  at  Hampton.  He 
also  organized  a  new  society.  He  had  twenty 
minutes  every  night  after  supper  before  work 
began.  Most  of  the  students,  he  observed,  wasted 
this  time.  He  proposed  that  good  use  be  made  of 
this  period  in  reading  and  speaking,  and  he  organ- 
ized a  society  for  that  purpose.  He  says  that  no 
time  he  spent  in  college  was  more  valuable  than 
this. 

After  the  close  of  his  second  year,  he  went  home 
to  Maiden  to  spend  his  vacation.  His  brother  John 
had  sent  him  some  money,  and  he  had  earned  some 
extra  money.  So  he  had  enough  to  take  him 
home.  Everybody  was  delighted  to  see  him,  but 
most  of  all,  his  mother.  All  the  neighbors  insisted 
on  his  visiting  them  and  taking  a  meal  with  them 


30  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

and  telling  all  about  his  college  days.  He  also 
spoke  at  Sunday  schools,  at  the  day  school,  and 
at  churches,  telling  about  his  life  at  Hampton. 

This  was  all  very  nice,  but  he  wanted  some 
work,  so  that  he  could  earn  enough  to  take  him 
back  to  Hampton  in  the  fall.  He  was  unable  to 
find  any  work  because  the  salt  furnaces  and  the 
coal  mines  were  closed.  One  day  he  went  further 
than  usual  looking  for  something  to  do  but  with- 
out success.  On  his  way  home  he  became  so  tired 
that  he  went  into  a  deserted  cabin  by  the  road 
to  spend  the  night.  About  three  o'clock  some  one 
woke  him  up.  It  was  his  brother  John,  who  told 
him  that  their  mother  had  just  died. 

This  was  a  terrible  shock  to  Booker.  He  had 
had  no  idea  his  mother  was  so  ill.  He  had  always 
wanted  to  be  with  her  and  care  for  her.  He  had 
looked  forward  to  the  time  when  he  might  make 
enough  money  for  her  to  live  in  comfort.  He  loved 
her  very  dearly,  and  her  death  was  the  hardest 
blow  he  had  ever  received. 

It  was  not  long  after  this  that  he  got  some 
work  and  saved  enough  money  to  take  him  back 
to  Hampton.  During  his  third  year  at  college 
he  worked  harder  than  ever.  He  was  still  working 
as  janitor,  but  every  single  minute  he  had  after 
his  wrork  wTas  done  he  spent  on  his  studies.  Col- 
lege boys  in  those  days  did  not  have  time  to  play 
football,  baseball,  and  tennis.  They  did  not  have 
time  to  go  on  picnics  or  have  dances. 


32  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

The  highest  honor  at  Hampton  was  to  be 
selected  as  commencement  speaker.  This  honor 
Booker  was  anxious  to  win.  He  worked  very  hard 
for  it,  and,  when  commencement  day  came  in 
June,  1875,  he  sat  on  the  platform  among  the 
honor  men  of  his  class  as  one  of  the  orators.  He 
was  given  his  diploma,  and  his  college  days  were 
over. 

He  had  done  a  good  job.  He  had  done  the  kind 
of  work  that  makes  real  men.  He  had  trained  his 
mind  and  his  hands.  He  had  built  character. 
He  was  not  ashamed.  He  could  hold  his  head  up 
and  look  the  world  in  the  face.  He  had  learned 
to  help  himself.  He  was  independent  and  had 
gained  self-confidence  and  self-control.  He  knew 
little  of  Latin,  but  he  knew  much  of  labor.  He 
knew  no  Greek,  but  he  knew  how  to  dig.  He  knew 
the  soil.  He  knew  people.  He  was  ready  for  the 
great  work  that  lay  before  him. 


CHAPTER  V 

BEGINNING   LIFE    IN    THE   OUTSIDE   WORLD 

General  Armstrong  handed  Washington  his 
diploma  in  June,  1875,  and  he  walked  forth  from 
the  college  walls  a  very  proud  and  happy  boy.  He 
had  a  right  to  be.  No  boy  had  ever  striven  harder 
for  an  education.  For  three  years,  day  and  night, 
he  had  worked,  as  few  people  ever  had.  But  he 
had  enjoyed  it.  Don't  get  the  idea  that  Washing- 
ton was  discouraged  or  that  he  was  unhappy,  for 
he  was  not.  He  got  an  immense  amount  of  gen- 
uine satisfaction  and  pleasure  out  of  his  school 
days.  His  teachers  were  good  to  him,  and  he  was 
devoted  to  them.  His  classmates  were  always 
kind  to  him  and  helpful  and  thoughtful.  Every- 
body was  his  friend.  No  boy  ever  left  Hampton 
with  more  warm  friends,  was  more  beloved  by 
students  and  faculty,  than  Booker  Washington. 
And  these  friendships  were  truly  worth  winning, 
because  they  were  greater  and  better  than  any- 
thing else  in  the  world. 

One  of  the  fine  things  about  Washington  was  his 
independence.  He  knew  how  to  take  care  of  him- 
self. He  knew  he  could  make  his  own  way  in  the 
world.  He  was  unusually  robust,  because  he  had 
always  taken  good  care  of  himself.     With  health, 

33 


34  BOOKER   T.    WASHINGTON 

with  an  education,  and  with  an  overwhelming 
desire  to  help  his  people,  he  left  Hampton  and 
started  his  life  in  the  outside  world. 

Washington  left  Hampton  in  exactly  the  same 
financial  condition  as  when  he  entered.  He  had 
a  diploma  in  his  pocket  but  no  money.  However, 
he  wras  not  ashamed  of  work,  if  it  was  honorable, 
and  he  was  not  afraid  of  any  amount  of  it.  Along 
with  some  other  Hampton  boys,  he  was  offered 
a  job  in  a  summer  hotel  in  Connecticut. 

When  he  began  his  new  work,  he  had  an  em- 
barrassing experience.  The  head  waiter,  somehow, 
got  the  idea  that  he  had  done  this  kind  of  work 
before.  He  sent  him  to  serve  at  a  table  where 
several  rich  peoole  were  seated.  Washington  was 
very  awkward  and  confused,  and  the  people 
scolded  him  soundly.  It  frightened  him  so  that 
he  went  away  and  wTould  not  return  to  the  table, 
leaving  the  guests  without  anything  to  eat. 

For  this  offense,  the  head  waiter  reduced  him 
from  his  position  as  waiter  and  put  him  to  wash- 
ing dishes.  Thereupon,  he  made  up  his  mind  that 
he  would  learn  to  do  this  job  well.  So  successful 
was  he  that  the  head  waiter  soon  put  him  back 
at  serving,  and  he  made  one  of  the  best  waiters 
in  the  hotel. 

When  his  summer's  work  was  done,  Washington 
returned  to  his  old  home  at  Maiden.  Soon  after 
his  arrival,  he  was  chosen  to  teach  the  school  there. 
He  accepted  the  place  and  began  the  work  at  once, 


IN   THE   OUTSIDE   WORLD  35 

He  taught  this  school  for  two  years,  and  it  is 
doubtful  if  he  ever  did  better  work  in  his  life  than 
during  these  two  years. 

All  his  life  the  idea  had  been  in  Washington's 
mind  that  he  must  help  his  people.  This  was  what 
he  wanted  most  to  do.  This  was  why  he  wanted 
an  education.  Many  people  want  an  education 
for  selfish  reasons,  such  as,  to  make  money  for 
themselves,  to  have  an  easy  time  or  to  get  honors  for 
themselves,  but  this  was  never  true  of  Booker 
Washington.  His  great  desire  was  to  help  his 
people.  He  looked  about  him  and  saw  how  poor 
and  helpless  and  ignorant  they  were,  and  his  heart 
was  touched.  He  wanted  to  do  something  that 
would  make  his  people  better  and  happier. 

Now  he  had  his  first  chance.  He  went  at  his 
work  with  great  joy.  He  opened  his  school  at 
eight  o'clock  in  the  morning,  and  he  usually  quit 
work  about  ten  o'clock  at  night.  He  taught  the 
children  reading,  writing,  geography  and  arith- 
metic, but  he  taught  them  something  else  too. 
He  made  them  comb  their  hair.  He  made  them 
keep  their  hands  and  faces  clean.  He  taught  them 
to  keep  their  clothing  clean.  He  taught  them  to 
use  a  toothbrush,  and  to  know  the  value  of  a  bath. 

He  organized  a  debating  society  for  the  men  and 
boys.  He  opened  a  night  school  so  that  those  who 
worked  and  could  not  go  to  school  during  the  day 
could  go  at  night.  He  established  a  reading  room. 
He  taught  several  boys  privately  in  order  to  get 


36  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

them  ready  to  enter  Hampton.  He  taught  in 
two  Sunday  schools.  In  fact,  he  did  more  to  make 
his  community  a  good,  clean,  happy  community 
than  anybody  had  ever  done  before. 

One  of  the  good  things  he  did  was  to  help  his 
brother  John  who  had  helped  him  so  much  while 
he  was  at  Hampton  and  now  wanted  to  go  to  school 
himself.  What  a  joy  it  was  to  Booker  to  be  able 
to  do  something  for  this  kind  and  generous  brother ! 
John  did  go  to  Hampton,  as  did  another  brother, 
James,  who  was  an  adopted  child;  and  both 
helped  Washington  loyally  in  later  years  at  Tuske- 
gee. 

After  teaching  two  years  at  Maiden,  Washington 
decided  to  go  to  school  again.  This  time  he  went 
to  Washington,  D.  C,  and  entered  Wayland  Semi- 
nary, where  he  remained  eight  months.  He  did 
not  care  so  much  for  his  work  here.  It  was  very 
different  from  the  work  at  Hampton.  The  stu- 
dents were  all  well  dressed.  They  did  not  have  to 
work  as  they  did  at  Hampton.  They  had  plenty 
of  money,  and  their  studies  were  different.  They 
did  not  have  trades,  industries,  agricultural  work, 
or  dairying,  or  anything  of  that  kind.  They  had 
Latin  and  Greek  and  literature  and  higher  mathe- 
matics and  other  studies  of  a  similar  kind.  Wash- 
ington felt  that  he  did  not  get  the  benefit  that  he 
did  at  Hampton. 

Nor  did  he  like  Washington  any  better  than  he 
liked  this  school.    He  saw  too  much  extravagance 


IN   THE   OUTSIDE   WORLD  37 

to  suit  him.  Too  many  people  were  trying  to  get 
something  for  nothing.  Too  many  of  them  were 
trying  to  get  jobs  with  the  Federal  Government 
that  would  be  easy  work  and  high  pay.  Many  of 
the  negroes  seemed  to  think  it  was  the  business 
of  the  Federal  Government  to  support  them. 
Washington  did  not  think  this  was  right.  He 
thought  all  men  should  do  good,  honest  work,  and 
that,  if  they  didn't,  they  would  sooner  or  later 
find  trouble.  He  was  glad  to  get  away,  for  he  felt 
that  the  life  that  most  of  the  negroes  lived  at  that 
time  in  Washington  was  most  unsatisfactory. 

At  the  end  of  the  eight  months,  he  returned  to 
Maiden  again.  At  this  time  there  was  a  big 
campaign  on  in  West  Virginia  to  remove  the 
capital,  which  was  located  at  Wheeling.  It  was 
far  up  in  the  northern  part  of  the  state.  Many  of 
the  people  wanted  another  city  to  be  chosen. 
The  legislature  selected  three  cities  to  be  voted 
upon  by  the  people  and  Charleston  was  one  of 
these.  Maiden,  you  remember,  was  five  miles 
from  Charleston.  Just  after  he  returned  from 
Washington,  Booker  was  greatly  pleased  to  receive 
an  invitation  from  a  committee  of  white  men  to 
come  to  Charleston  and  then  go  on  a  speaking 
tour  in  behalf  of  that  city.  He  accepted  the  in- 
vitation, and  for  three  months  he  went  about  the 
state  speaking  for  Charleston  as  the  capital.  When 
the  election  was  held,  Charleston  won;  and  no 
small  part  of  the  credit  was  due  to  the  brilliant 


38  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

speeches  made  by  the  young  negro  teacher  of 
Maiden. 

He  made  such  a  reputation  as  a  speaker  in  this 
campaign  that  everybody  took  it  for  granted  that 
he  would  now  study  law  and  enter  politics.  A 
well-known  judge  tried  to  persuade  him  to  do 
this  and  offered  to  teach  him  law.  This  was  very 
flattering,  and  for  a  while  Washington  considered 
it.  But  all  the  time  he  had  the  feeling  that  there 
was  something  else  he  must  do.  He  felt  that  he 
could  succeed  in  law  and  politics,  but  he  also  felt 
that  it  would  be  selfish;  that  he  would  be  doing 
something  largely  to  benefit  himself  only. 

Most  of  the  negro  men  in  politics,  at  that  time, 
were  vicious  and  ignorant.  Of  course  there  were 
many  exceptions;  but,  as  a  general  thing,  the  negro 
who  was  in  politics  during  that  period  was  un- 
educated and  often  dishonest.  Washington  tells 
of  passing  a  crowd  of  men  one  day  as  they  were  at 
work  on  a  building.  He  heard  the  men  saying 
to  one  of  the  others,  "Hurry  up,  Gov.,"  and 
"Hurry,  Governor."  He  paid  no  attention  at 
first  but  finally  made  inquiry  and  found  that  the 
negro  spoken  to  had  at  one  time  been  the  lieuten- 
ant governor  of  the  state. 

Washington  felt  that  the  greatest  thing  he  could 
do  was  to  engage  in  the  kind  of  work  that  would 
help  his  own  people  most.  He  did  not  want 
to  preach.  He  thought  there  were  too  many 
preachers  already.    He  had  the  belief  that  the  most 


IN   THE   OUTSIDE   WORLD  39 

important  thing  to  do  was  to  engage  in  the  kind 
of  work  that  would  fit  men  of  his  own  race  to  be 
good  preachers,  good  teachers,  and  good  citizens. 

In  the  midst  of  these  thoughts,  and  before  he 
had  definitely  made  up  his  mind  as  to  his  career, 
he  received  a  letter  from  General  Armstrong,  in- 
viting him  to  deliver  the  "  postgraduate ' '  address 
at  Hampton  at  commencement,  1879.  This  honor 
brought  Washington  great  joy.  He  accepted  the 
invitation  and  chose  as  his  subject,  "The  Force 
That  Wins."  He  worked  hard  for  three  months 
on  his  speech.  It  made  a  great  impression  on  all 
who  heard  it,  and  he  was  acclaimed  one  of  the 
real  orators  of  his  race. 


CHAPTER  VI 

BACK   AT    HAMPTON 

There  is  an  old  saying  that  "opportunity  knocks 
but  once"  upon  our  door.  This  is  not  true.  Op- 
portunities will  certainly  continue  to  come  to  us. 
The  important  thing  is  to  be  ready  for  them  when 
they  come.  We  never  know  what  incident  may 
turn  out  to  be  our  greatest  opportunity.  If  we 
will  do  our  best  to  meet  every  situation  that  con- 
fronts us,  we  may  be  sure  that  there  will  be  plenty 
of  opportunities  for  us.  It  is  the  boy  that  does 
not  do  his  best  on  all  occasions  that  loses  out.  So 
Washington,  when  invited  to  speak  at  Hampton 
commencement,  worked  hard  for  three  months 
preparing  that  speech.  When  the  time  came,  he 
did  his  very  best.  Then  he  forgot  the  matter  and 
went  home.  Just  a  few  days  after  he  got  home,  he 
had  a  great  surprise.  There  came  a  letter  to  him 
from  General  Armstrong.  It  said,  "We  need  you 
here  at  Hampton.  We  want  you  to  come  and  help 
us  run  the  school." 

That  was  a  very  happy  moment  in  the  life  of 
Washington.  He  thought  more  of  General  Arm- 
strong than  of  any  other  man  in  the  world.  To 
be  asked  by  this  man  to  come  and  work  for  him 

40 


BACK  AT   HAMPTON  41 

made  Washington  an  exceedingly  happy  man. 
He  immediately  wrote  that  he  would  accept  the 
position.  Some  weeks  later  he  reached  Hampton, 
ready  to  enter  upon  his  new  duties. 

His  job  was  a  rather  peculiar  one.  The  Indians 
in  the  United  States,  who  had  been  put  upon 
certain  territories  out  West,  after  being  taken  from 
their  land  in  the  South  and  Southwest,  had  no 
system  of  education  and  were  entirely  without 
schools  of  any  kind. 

General  Armstrong  wanted  to  help  them.  He 
said  he  believed  that  they  could  be  educated,  and 
he  wanted  to  try  it.  The  Government  of  the 
United  States  gave  its  consent  and  agreed  to  co- 
operate with  him. 

They  brought  from  the  West  to  Hampton  about 
one  hundred  Indian  boys  to  be  educated.  These 
boys  were  very  ignorant;  Booker  Washington 
says  that  they  were  almost  wild. 

Washington's  task  was  to  live  in  the  same  build- 
ing with  these  Indian  boys  and  look  after  them  — 
to  be  a  sort  of  " house  father"  to  them. 

He  had  a  hard  job.  The  Indians  are  a  very 
proud  people.  They  felt  themselves  superior  to 
the  white  race,  as  well  as  to  the  black  race.  They 
had  a  special  dislike  for  the  negro  because  he  had 
been  a  slave,  and  the  Indians  would  not  be  slaves; 
they  preferred  death  to  slavery. 

These  boys  were  not  only  very  ignorant,  but 
it    was    very    hard    to    make    them    understand, 


42  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

as  they  did  not  know  the  English  language 
well.  Furthermore,  everybody  expected  them  to 
fail. 

We  usually  do  just  about  what  people  expect  of 
us.  If  they  think  we  are  going  to  succeed,  it  helps 
us  to  succeed.  If  they  think  we  are  going  to  fail, 
it  makes  attainment  of  success  harder  for  us. 
Booker  Washington  said:  "I  will  succeed.  I  will 
show  these  people  that  these  Indians  can  be 
educated."  So  for  an  entire  year  he  worked  with 
them.  He  soon  won  their  confidence  and  respect. 
That  they  all  liked  him  was  evident,  for  they  did 
everything  they  could  to  satisfy  him  and  please 
him.  He  found  them  ready  to  work  hard  and  in- 
telligent enough  to  be  taught.  They  learned  the 
different  kinds  of  trades  just  about  as  well  as  the 
negroes  did.  At  the  end  of  the  year  everybody 
was  willing  to  admit  that  Washington  had  made  a 
success  of  teaching  the  Indians.  Ever  since  then 
Indians  have  been  going  to  Hampton,  and  many 
of  them  are  students  there  to-day. 

Washington  says  his  hardest  task  was  to  get 
them  to  give  up  some  of  their  old  habits  and 
customs.  They  did  not  want  to  part  with  their 
long  hair;  they  did  not  want  to  quit  wearing 
blankets  or  quit  smoking.  However,  since  these 
customs  wTere  not  customs  at  Hampton,  they  all 
agreed  to  do  as  the  others  did  there. 

Now  came  another  very  important  work  for 
Washington.      After    he    had    worked    with    the 


BACK  AT   HAMPTON  43 

Indians  for  a  year,  General  Armstrong  said,   "I 
have  another  hard  job  for  you." 

"Show  it  to  me,"  Washington  replied. 

A  great  many  people  who  did  not  have  any 
money  were  trying  to  enter  Hampton ;  they  were  as 
poor  as  Washington  was  when  he  entered.  Gen- 
eral Armstrong  did  not  want  to  turn  them  away. 
He  finally  determined  that  he  would  arrange  it  so 
these  people  could  work  all  day  at  some  trade  or 
other  line  of  work  and  thus  pay  their  living  ex- 
penses and  have  something  left  over  to  go  into 
the  treasurer's  office  to  their  account.  They  had 
to  work  ten  hours  a  day  to  do  this.  Then  they 
went  to  school  two  hours  at  night.  After  a  year 
or  two  they  would  have  enough  money  saved  up 
from  their  work  to  enable  them  to  enter  the  day 
school.  This  plan  proved  to  be  a  very  fine  one, 
and  many  of  the  best  students  from  Hampton 
began  in  the  night  school. 

It  was  this  night  school  that  General  Armstrong 
wanted  Washington  to  teach.  He  took  charge  of 
it  and  made  a  great  success  of  it.  There  were 
about  twelve  in  the  class  to  begin  with.  The  boys 
worked  in  the  sawmill  in  the  daytime,  and  the 
girls  in  the  laundry.  They  were  such  good  workers 
that  he  named  them  the  "Plucky  Class."  After 
a  boy  or  a  girl  had  been  in  this  class  long  enough 
to  show  that  he  or  she  meant  business  and  was 
going  to  stick  to  the  job,  Washington  would  give 
a  certificate  that  read  as  follows; 


44  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

"This  is  to  certify  that  James  Smith  is  a  member 
of  the  Plucky  Class  of  the  Hampton  Institute  and 
is  in  good  and  regular  standing."  l 

The  students  were  very  proud  of  these  certifi- 
cates. It  was  not  long  before  everybody  at  Hamp- 
ton was  talking  about  the  ''Plucky  Class."  In 
a  little  while  there  were  twenty-five  in  the  group. 
The  number  kept  on  growing  the  next  year,  and 
in  a  few  years  the  class  had  several  hundred  mem- 
bers. It  is  a  big  part  of  Hampton  and  Tuskegee 
to-day,  for  Washington  used  the  same  idea  at 
Tuskegee. 

Washington  had  a  way  of  succeeding  in  every- 
thing he  undertook.  This  was  because  he  deter- 
mined to  succeed  and  worked  so  hard  and  so  well 
that  success  was  certain. 

1  "Up  from  Slaver}-,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  p.  105. 


CHAPTER  VII 

BUILDING   A   GREAT   SCHOOL 

At  Hampton  the  chapel  exercises  were  at  night. 
Here  they  sang  the  beautiful  old  negro  melodies 
and  listened  to  a  talk  by  General  Armstrong,  or 
some  other  good  speaker.  One  Sunday  night  in 
May,  1 88 1,  after  the  regular  exercises,  General 
Armstrong,  who  had  a  way  of  taking  the  students 
into  his  confidence  as  well  as  keeping  them  in- 
formed of  matters  of  interest  to  the  race,  an- 
nounced that  he  had  received  a  very  interesting 
letter.  He  then  told  them  that  the  Legislature  of 
Alabama  at  its  last  session  had  set  aside  some 
money  for  the  establishment  of  a  negro  normal 
school,  and  that  they  were  looking  for  a  man  to 
be  the  head  of  this  school  and  that  he  had  been 
asked  to  recommend  such  a  man.  Of  course  they 
wanted  a  white  man.  However,  the  next  day 
General  Armstrong  sent  for  Booker  Washington 
and  said:  "Washington,  you  heard  the  announce- 
ment last  night  about  the  men  in  Alabama  who 
want  a  man  to  be  the  head  of  their  school.  I 
have  decided  that  you  are  the  man  for  them. 
Will  you  take  the  place  if  it  is  offered  to  you?" 

This  was  surely  a  great  surprise,  but  Booker 
Washington  was  always  ready.  He  said:  ' 'I  think 
I  can  fill  the  place,  and  I  am  willing  to  try." 

45 


46  BOOKER   T.    WASHINGTON 

General  Armstrong  wrote  at  once  about  Wash- 
ington. The  next  Sunday  night,  during  the 
chapel  exercises,  a  telegram  was  handed  to  General 
Armstrong.  It  was  from  the  committee  in  Ala- 
bama. He  opened  it,  and  read  it  to  the  audience. 
It  said:  " Booker  Washington  will  suit  us.  Send 
him  at  once."  1 

Washington  prepared  to  go  at  once  to  his  new 
field.  After  finishing  his  work  at  Hampton,  he 
paid  a  visit  to  his  old  home  at  Maiden,  and  a 
couple  of  weeks  later,  early  in  June,  he  arrived  at 
Tuskegee,  Alabama,  to  begin  his  new  task. 

Tuskegee  at  this  time  was  a  quiet  little  town  of 
about  two  thousand  inhabitants.  It  is  on  a  small 
branch  railroad,  five  miles  from  the  main  line, 
which  runs  from  Atlanta,  Georgia,  to  Montgomery, 
Alabama.  The  town  is  about  fifty  miles  from 
Montgomery.  It  is  right  in  the  heart  of  what  is 
known  as  the  "Black  Belt"  in  the  South.  A 
large  and  typical  population  lived  round  about. 
The  town  was  the  county  seat  of  Macon  County, 
in  which  lived  a  large  number  of  negro  farmers, 
all  living  very  much  as  the  negro  family  lived  in 
the  South  at  that  time.  The  white  people  and  the 
negroes  were  about  equal  in  population  in  the 
town  and  lived  in  cordial  and  friendly  relations. 

Booker  Washington  had  a  great  surprise  await- 
ing him  when  he  reached  Tuskegee.  He  thought 
that  this  school  that  he  was  to  be  the  head  of  was 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  p.  107. 


BUILDING  A   GREAT  SCHOOL  47 

already  in  existence  and  naturally  looked  about  to 
find  the  schoolhouse,  of  course  expecting  to  see 
a  nice  building.  Imagine  his  surprise  when  he 
found  that  there  was  as  yet  no  school  at  all 
and  absolutely  no  building,  no  sign  of  a  school 
whatsoever.  He  was  to  start  this  school  himself 
from  the  very  beginning.  The  legislature  had 
simply  set  aside  two  thousand  dollars  a  year  to  be 
used  only  for  paying  salaries,  and  no  provision 
had  been  made  for  building  and  grounds. 

Was  Booker  Washington  discouraged?  Not  for 
a  single  minute  did  he  sit  down  and  whine  and 
complain  and  say  that  he  might  as  well  give  up. 
He  went  right  out  into  the  town,  looked  up  some 
of  the  leading  men  of  both  races,  and  told  them 
that  he  was  going  to  start  something;  that  he 
was  going  to  open  a  school.  And  the  men,  a  little 
amazed  at  first,  caught  his  enthusiasm  and  said: 
"Good  for  you.  We  are  with  you.  You  can 
count  on  us.     We  will  help." 

His  first  effort  was  to  find  a  house  to  use  as  a 
school  building,  and  he  finally  secured  a  little 
shanty  that  stood  near  the  A.  M.  E.  Church.  It 
was  agreed  that  he  could  use  this  building  for 
meetings  of  any  kind,  and  that  he  could  teach  in 
the  shanty.  After  consulting  again  with  his 
friends,  he  announced  that  on  July  4,  1881,  the 
Tuskegee  Institute  would  open. 

Now  that  he  had  a  place  in  which  to  begin  work, 
his  next  job  was  to  get  students  for  his  school. 


48  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

He  began  to  visit  around  in  the  country,  making 
talks  in  the  churches  at  the  regular  service  or  at 
Sunday  school  and  at  preaching  services  in  school- 
houses  and  other  places.  He  visited  in  the  homes 
of  the  people,  and  everywhere  he  told  them  of 
his  school  plans. 

In  this  way  he  came  to  know  the  people  just  as 
they  lived,  and  they  learned  how  sympathetic 
Washington  was,  and  how  he  was  trying  to  help 
them.  Most  of  those  he  visited  he  found  living 
in  one-  or  two-room  houses,  with  fat  pork  and  corn 
bread  as  their  principal  food.  But  they  always 
treated  him  kindly  and  entertained  him  the  best 
they  could.  One  thing  that  distressed  him  was 
the  discovery  that  many  of  these  people  had  been 
persuaded  to  buy  such  things  as  costly  sewing 
machines  and  organs,  when  they  didn't  have 
enough  to  eat  and  to  wear.  At  one  place  where 
he  took  dinner  there  were  four  in  the  family,  and 
when  they  sat  down  at  the  table,  he  found  that 
there  was  but  one  fork  for  all  five  of  them. 

Their  lives  were  filled  with  much  drudgery  and 
hard  work  and  almost  no  opportunities  for  im- 
provement. It  was  nearly  impossible  for  them 
to  make  a  living,  much  less  save  any  money. 
Their  schools,  if  they  had  any  at  all,  had  very 
short  terms  and  were  taught  by  teachers  who  knew 
very  little  more  than  the  children.  It  was  a  dis- 
couraging situation  to  any  one  except  a  man  like 
Booker   Washington.      " These   are   my   people," 


BUILDING  A   GREAT   SCHOOL        49 

he  said.  "They  need  help.  They  need  education 
and  the  kind  of  education  that  will  give  them 
cleaner  and  happier  homes,  healthier  bodies,  better 
schools,  and  better  life  in  every  way.  I  am  going 
to  help  them." 

The  school  opened  on  July  4,  1881,  with  thirty 
students.  Washington  was  the  only  teacher. 
A  large  number  of  students  wanted  to  enter,  but 
he  decided  not  to  admit  any  under  fifteen  years 
of  age.  Some  of  these  students  were  boys,  and 
some  were  girls;  some  were  grown  men  and 
women.  Most  of  them  had  been  teachers.  None 
of  them  was  very  well  prepared,  however,  for  they 
had  been  very  poorly  taught.  But  the  teacher 
found  all  of  them  eager  to  learn  and  ready  to 
work. 

Soon  there  were  more  students  calling  for  ad- 
mission. Within  six  weeks  there  were  fifty  stu- 
dents. It  was  necessary  to  have  a  new  teacher, 
and  the  person  secured  for  this  work  was  Olivia 
Davidson,  who  afterwards  became  Booker  Wash- 
ington's second  wife. 

She  was  a  great  help  to  him,  and  she  agreed 
with  him  that  they  must  do  something  for  the 
students  besides  merely  teaching  them  books. 
Washington  says  that  they  wanted  to  teach  them 
how  to  be  clean;  how  to  take  care  of  their  teeth 
and  clothing;  what  and  how  to  eat;  and  how  to 
make  a  living. 

All  these  pupils  lived  on  the  farm,  as  did  nearly 


5o  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

all  the  people  of  the  South.  Washington  wanted 
to  so  teach  them  that  they  would  continue  to  live 
among  their  own  people  and  their  lives  would  be 
happier  and  better  in  every  way.  He  did  not  want 
them  to  get  a  false  idea  about  education.  Many 
of  them  had  the  wrong  impression  already.  They 
thought  that  getting  an  education  consisted  in 
reading  big  books  and  then  of  being  able  to  earn 
a  living  without  work.  Both  of  these  ideas  were 
wrong.  He  wanted  to  teach  them  something  that 
would  make  them  useful  and  happy  and  prosperous 
on  the  land  in  their  native  state. 

He  certainly  could  not  do  this  while  teaching  in 
a  little  old  shanty  with  one  room  that  was  in  such 
bad  condition  that  one  of  the  pupils  had  to  hold 
an  umbrella  over  the  teacher  when  it  rained. 
He  had  this  same  experience  at  his  boarding  house, 
where  his  landlady  often  held  an  umbrella  over 
him  while  he  ate  his  breakfast. 

About  three  months  after  the  opening  of  his 
school,  a  small  farm  about  one  mile  from  town  was 
offered  for  sale.  Washington  went  out  and  looked 
it  over  and  came  to  the  conclusion  that  it  was  just 
the  place  for  the  kind  of  school  that  he  intended 
to  build.  But  the  price  was  $500,  and  he  didn't 
have  a  dollar.  The  owner  said:  "Pay  me  $250 
cash,  and  I  will  give  you  one  year  to  pay  the 
other."  Washington  borrowed  $250  and  closed  the 
deal. 

He  decided  to  move  the  school  at  once  to  the 


BUILDING  A   GREAT   SCHOOL 


5i 


new  home.  On  this  farm  were  four  buildings. 
The  "big  house"  had  been  burned,  but  there  was 
left  standing  a  little  cabin,  formerly  used  as  a 
dining  room,  an  old  kitchen,  a  stable,  and  a  hen- 
house. Booker  Washington  and  his  growing  school 
moved  into  these  four  buildings. 

The    buildings    were    thoroughly    cleaned    and 
worked  over  and  put  in  as  good  condition  as  pos- 


Tuskegee's  First  Group  of  Buildings 


sible.  Washington  says,  "I  recall  one  morning, 
when  I  told  an  old  colored  man  who  lived  near, 
and  who  sometimes  helped  me,  that  our  school 
had  grown  so  large  that  it  would  be  necessary  for 
us  to  use  the  henhouse  for  school  purposes,  and 
that  I  wanted  him  to  help  me  give  it  a  thorough 
cleaning  out  the  next  day,  he  replied,  in  a  most 
earnest  manner,  'What  do  you  mean,  boss?    You 


52  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

sholy  ain't  going  to  clean  out  the  henhouse  in  the 
daytime!"'  l 

Do  you  know  what  a  ''chopping  bee"  is?  Well, 
the  students  of  Tuskegee  didn't  know  until  Booker 
Washington  taught  them.  After  they  had  been 
in  their  new  quarters  for  several  weeks,  Washing- 
ton walked  in  one  day  and  said:  "To-morrow  we 
are  going  to  have  a  'chopping  bee.'  Now  all  of 
you  that  have  an  axe  bring  it  to  school  with  you. 
Those  of  you  who  do  not  have  one,  let  me  know, 
and  I'll  get  one  for  you.  We  will  dismiss  school 
early  and  go  to  the  'bee.'"  2 

Next  day  everybody  had  an  axe,  and  all  of  them 
were  wondering  what  sort  of  game  a  "chopping 
bee"  was.  They  had  never  been  to  one,  and  they 
were  much  excited  over  it. 

Soon  after  dinner  Washington  got  his  axe  and 
threw  it  on  his  shoulder  and  told  the  boys  to  come 
on.  They  eagerly  followed.  He  led  them  out  to 
the  woods  and  began  cutting  down  a  tree,  and 
told  them  to  do  the  same  thing.  They  did  so. 
Washington,  swinging  his  axe  faster  and  better 
than  any  of  them,  led  the  crowd,  though  all  of 
them  were  doing  their  best.  And  as  they  just 
kept  on  at  this,  it  presently  dawned  on  them  that 
a  "chopping  bee,"  after  all,  was  nothing  but  plain 
cutting  down  trees  and  clearing  land.     Some  of 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  p.  130. 

2  "Booker  T.  Washington:  Builder  of  a  Civilization,"  by  Scott  and 
Stowe,  p.  6. 


BUILDING  A   GREAT  SCHOOL        53 

the  students  became  angry.  They  said  they  did 
not  come  to  school  to  do  that  kind  of  work;  they 
came  to  study  books.  But  they  looked  at  Wash- 
ington, who  was  an  educated  man,  and  they  saw 
that  he  was  not  ashamed  to  do  this  kind  of  work. 
After  a  time  they  began  to  see  what  Washington's 
purpose  was,  and  they  quit  complaining  and  gladly 
helped  with  all  their  might  to  get  this  needful 
work  done. 

There  was  another  way  in  which  Washington 
secured  the  assistance  of  others  to  build  up  his 
school.  He  had  no  way  of  going  about  over  the 
country  except  by  walking.  He  did  not  have  a 
horse  or  a  mule,  and  he  could  not  cover  much 
territory  by  walking.  So  he  would  watch  for  some 
old  negro  with  a  mule  and  wagon  and  go  to  him 
and  tell  him  all  about  his  plans.  Then  he  would 
say:  "Now,  Uncle,  don't  you  want  to  help  in  this 
good  work?  Well,  come  around  early  Saturday 
morning  with  your  mule  and  wagon  and  take  me 
out  in  the  country,  where  I  can  see  the  people  and 
tell  them  about  our  school,"  l  and  the  old  man 
would  be  there  on  time. 

So,  with  the  cordial  cooperation  of  the  students 
and  friends  in  the  town,  the  school  was  making 
progress.  Land  was  being  cleared,  and  the  build- 
ings and  grounds  were  being  improved.  Washing- 
ton was  spreading  the  fame  of  his  school  through- 

1  "Booker  T.  Washington:  Builder  of  a  Civilization,"  by  Scott  and 
Stowe,  p.  7. 


54  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

out   the   country   and   every   one   was   becoming 
interested. 

But  that  debt  of  five  hundred  dollars  for  the 
land  on  which  the  school  was  being  built  had  not 
been  paid.  Where  was  the  money  coming  from? 
That  was  the  hard  question.  Miss  Davidson 
started  the  plan  of  having  suppers  or  "festivals." 
She  would  go  about  town  and  get  friends  to  donate 
a  chicken  or  a  cake  or  a  pie  for  a  supper.  In  this 
way  a  good  sum  was  raised.  Washington  wrote 
to  his  friends,  explained  the  situation,  and  asked 
for  contributions.  He  asked  the  negroes  as  well  as 
the  white  people  in  town  to  give,  and  they  did. 
Washington  says  that  sometimes  they  would  give 
five  cents,  or  twenty -five  cents,  or  a  quilt  or  some 
sugar  cane.  "I  recall  one  old  colored  woman," 
he  says,  "who  was  about  seventy  years  of  age,  — 
she  hobbled  into  the  room  where  I  was,  leaning 
on  a  cane.  She  was  clad  in  rags,  but  they  were 
clean.  She  said:  'Mr.  Washington,  God  knows 
I  spent  de  bes'  days  of  my  life  in  slavery.  God 
knows  I's  ignorant  and  poor;  but  I  know  what 
you  and  Miss  Davidson  is  try  in*  to  do.  I  knows 
you  is  tryin'  to  make  better  men  and  women  for 
de  colored  race.  I  ain't  got  no  money,  but  I  wants 
you  to  take  dese  six  eggs,  what  I's  been  savin'  up, 
and  I  wants  you  to  put  dese  eggs  into  de  eddica- 
tion  of  dose  boys  and  gals.'"  1  Washington  says 
that  he   has  received  many    gifts    for  Tuskegee, 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  p.  132. 


BUILDING  A   GREAT   SCHOOL  55 

but  none  that  affected  him  more  deeply  than 
this  one. 

Needless  to  say,  by  the  end  of  the  year  the  five 
hundred  dollars  had  been  raised  and  the  debt  paid. 

Thus  ended  the  first  year  of  the  history  of  Tuske- 
gee.  If  you  go  there  now  and  see  the  many  fine 
buildings,  the  broad  acres,  the  hundreds  of  stu- 
dents, and  everything  that  goes  to  make  up  a 
great  and  wonderful  college,  it  would  be  very  hard 
to  realize  that  it  started  off  with  one  little  shanty 
with  a  leaky  roof,  one  teacher,  and  thirty  students. 
From  this  simple  and  humble,  but  very  earnest 
beginning,  Tuskegee  grew  by  leaps  and  bounds 
until  it  came  to  be  the  most  remarkable  negro 
school  in  the  South. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

STRENUOUS    DAYS 

As  Booker  Washington  began  the  second  year 
of  his  school,  he  met  a  new  obstacle.  That  was 
nothing  unusual  for  him,  however.  He  was 
usually  facing  a  hard  job.  He  spent  his  life  work- 
ing on  difficult  tasks,  and  he  never  found  one  that 
he  did  not  finish  with  satisfaction.  He  tackled 
this  problem  at  once  and  with  confidence. 

There  were  two  parts  to  it.  In  the  first  place, 
although  he  had  a  fine  farm  of  five  hundred  acres 
all  paid  for,  he  had  no  buildings,  except  that  old 
kitchen,  stable,  and  henhouse,  in  which  to  house 
his  students.  When  school  opened  in  the  fall  of 
1882,  there  were  about  one  hundred  and  fifty 
students  present.  These  three  or  four  little  old 
shacks  would  not  take  care  of  that  crowd.  What 
was  he  to  do?     This  was  his  first  difficulty. 

His  other  problem  was  this.  His  school  was 
just  outside  the  town  of  Tuskegee.  It  adjoined 
the  town.  A  great  many  people  in  Tuskegee 
thought  that  this  school  ought  not  to  be  built. 
Many  were  opposed  to  Booker  Washington.  Many 
were  opposed  to  educating  negroes,  and  they 
believed  that  negroes  went  to  school  simply  to 
get  out  of  work,  and  that  an  educated  negro  was 

56 


STRENUOUS   DAYS  57 

" sorry"  and  troublesome.  Then  there  were  some 
who  said:  "This  man  means  well,  but  he  is  just 
a  negro,  and,  of  course,  he  can't  succeed."  Then, 
there  were  others  who  said :  ' l  This  man  Washing- 
ton is  all  right.  I  believe  in  him  and  trust  him. 
He  is  doing  a  good  thing.  He  is  going  to  succeed. 
I  am  counting  on  him."  So,  his  second  job  was 
to  win  the  friendship  and  good  will  of  all  the 
people  in  the  town  and  round  about  and  not  to 
disappoint  those  who  believed  in  him.  He  worked 
out  these  two  problems  together,  as  we  shall  see 
from  what  happened. 

The  very  first  thing  needed  by  the  students 
after  all  was  not  a  building  but  something  to  eat. 
So  the  first  move  Washington  made  was  to  start 
the  students  to  work  on  the  farm  in  raising  a 
crop.  Every  day,  after  the  students  had  studied 
and  recited  their  lessons,  they  would  go  to  the 
fields  and  work.  We  have  already  learned  how 
they  found  out  what  a  "chopping  bee"  was. 
Now  they  were  working  in  the  fields  where  they 
had  previously  cut  down  the  trees.  Some  of  them 
did  not  like  this  work  at  first.  They  said:  "We 
did  not  come  to  school  to  do  work  like  this.  We 
have  had  enough  of  this  at  home."  But  Washing- 
ton kept  right  on,  working  hard  himself  and  show- 
ing his  students  that  he  was  not  ashamed  to  do 
hard  work  with  his  hands. 

The  next  thing  in  order  was  a  building  —  a 
good  building,  large  and  comfortable  and  useful. 


58 


BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 


He  began  to  make  plans  for  it.  He  knew  he  had 
to  have  it,  and,  although  he  really  did  not  have 
any  money  at  all  in  hand,  he  went  right  ahead 
and  planned  a  fine  building  to  cost  six  thousand 
dollars.     He  did  not  know  where  he  would  get  the 


A  Sunday  Afternoon  Band  Concert  on  the  Campus 


money,  but  he  had  a  firm  belief  that  in  some  way 
the  money  would  be  secured. 

When  it  was  learned  that  he  expected  to  put 
up  this  building,  a  man  who  lived  near  Tuskegee 
and  who  owned  a  sawmill  came  to  Washington 
and  said  to  him:  "I  have  been  watching  you.  I 
know  what  kind  "of  a  man  you  are.    You  will  keep 


STRENUOUS   DAYS  59 

your  word,  and  you  will  pay  your  debts.  I  see 
that  you  need  some  help.  I  just  want  to  say  that 
I  will  furnish  you  all  the  lumber  you  need  for  this 
building  at  once,  and  you  can  pay  just  whenever 
you  are  able."  Washington  explained  that,  while 
he  hoped  to  be  able  to  raise  the  money  to  pay  for 
the  building,  he  had  not  yet  secured  any  of  it.  The 
man  replied:  " That's  all  right.  Your  credit  is 
good  with  me;    I  will  trust  you." 

We  can  see  from  this  incident  how  well  he  was 
succeeding  in  making  friends  with  his  neighbors. 

As  soon  as  he  had  raised  a  part  of  the  money, 
he  let  the  man  put  the  material  on  the  ground. 
Then  the  building  was  begun,  and  again  the  stu- 
dents did  all  the  work.  They  first  digged  the 
foundations,  and  some  of  them  became  so  dis- 
gusted with  this  work  that  they  left  the  place 
altogether.  Washington  was  sorry  that  they 
left,  but  he  said  that  any  one  who  was  too  proud 
to  work  with  his  hands  and  help  out  at  a  time  like 
this  did  not  belong  in  his  school.  However, 
most  of  the  students  remained  and  were  perfectly 
willing  to  do  the  work.  Rapid  progress  was  made, 
the  foundations  were  finished,  and  they  were 
ready  for  the  laying  of  the  corner  stone. 

The  laying  of  the  corner  stone  of  this  building 
is  an  important  event  in  the  history  of  the  edu- 
cation of  the  negro.  There  was  a  great  crowd 
present.  Washington,  his  teachers,  his  students 
and  their  parents,  and  a  large  number  of  other 


60  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

negroes  were  there.  There  were  present,  also,  a 
large  number  of  white  people,  --  the  mayor  of  the 
town,  the  councilmen,  the  sheriff  and  all  the  other 
county  officers,  and  all  the  prominent  business 
and  professional  men  of  the  community. 

In  a  way  this  ceremony  marks  an  epoch  'n 
Negro  history  in  America.  Just  seventeen  years 
before,  it  was  against  the  law  for  a  negro  to  be 
taught  books  at  all  in  Alabama.  Just  seventeen 
years  before,  the  negroes  were  slaves,  —  for  this 
was  in  1882  and  in  the  "  Black  Belt,"  in  the  very 
heart  of  the  South.  That  this  large  group  of  white 
men  should  gather  with  the  negroes  for  the  pur- 
pose of  dedicating  a  building  to  negro  education 
shows  what  wonderful  change  of  sentiment  had 
taken  place.  It  shows  also  how  thoroughly  Booker 
Washington  had  won  the  confidence  of  all  the 
people  among  whom  he  was  working. 

All  his  students  were  from  Alabama.  Most  of 
them  were  from  the  country.  He  knew  that  most 
of  them  would  spend  their  lives  on  the  farm  or  in 
occupations  of  some  kind.  He  wanted  them  to  be 
practical;  to  know  how  to  do  well  the  things  they 
would  surely  be  compelled  to  do.  So  he  determined 
from  the  very  beginning  that  his  students  should 
learn  how  to  do  practical  things  as  well  as  learn 
from  books.  He  had  them  e'ear  the  1and  for  the 
school;  he  had  them  farm  the  cleared  lands;  he 
had  them  do  the  cooking;  he  had  them  make  the 
brick  and  build  the  buildings  of  the  school.     He 


STRENUOUS   DAYS 


61 


says  that  his  idea  was  to  teach  the  students  the 
best  methods  of  labor  and  how  to  derive  the 
greatest  benefit  from  their  work.  He  wanted  them 
to  learn  new  ways  of  work,  —  how  to  use  steam, 
water,  and  electricity.  He  also  wanted  to  teach 
them  that  work  was  dignified  and  honorable  and 


Automobile  and  Buggy  Trimming  at  Tuskegee 

that  no  man  should  be  ashamed  to  do  any  kind  of 
honest  work. 

He  followed  this  plan  till  his  death,  and  nearly 
every  one  of  the  many  buildings  that  stood  at 
Tuskegee  when  he  died  was  built  entirely  by  the 
students  themselves. 

They  planned  to  build  this  first  large  building  — 


62  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

"Porter  Hall"  they  called  it  —  of  brick;  so  they 
went  out  to  make  the  brick  right  there.  The 
students  did  not  like  this  work.  It  was  hard  and 
it  was  dirty.  However,  they  went  at  it  and,  after 
several  trials,  found  some  brick  clay. 

They  molded  the  brick,  built  the  kiln,  fired  it, 
and  waited.  When  the  burning  was  done,  they 
found  that  they  had  made  a  complete  failure. 
None  of  the  brick  could  be  used.  At  once  they 
built  another  kiln.  This  also  turned  out  to  be 
a  failure.  Some  of  them  were  discouraged  at  this, 
and  said:  "Let's  quit."  But  others  said:  "We 
must  succeed."  So  a  third  kiln  was  built.  This 
kiln  seemed  to  be  burning  splendidly  when  sud- 
denly, on  the  last  night,  it  fell. 

This  was  surely  discouraging,  but  Washington 
was  not  to  be  stopped  by  failure.  He  was  now  with- 
out a  dollar  to  continue  this  work.  He  happened 
to  think,  however,  of  a  watch  he  owned.  He  took 
the  watch  to  Montgomery,  Alabama,  near  by, 
pawned  it  for  fifteen  dollars,  came  home,  called 
the  workers  together  once  more,  built  another 
kiln,  and  this  time  the  kiln  was  a  success. 

Later,  when  he  went  back  to  get  his  watch,  it 
was  gone;  but  he  never  regretted  losing  it  in  such 
a  good  cause. 

Now  that  he  was  successful  in  making  bricks, 
the  work  progressed  on  the  buildings,  and  soon 
Porter  Hall  was  finished,  and  other  buildings  were 
started. 


STRENUOUS   DAYS  63 

There  were  two  other  things  Washington  wanted 
for  his  school.  One  was  a  place  for  his  students  to 
board,  and  the  other,  a  place  for  them  to  room. 
Washington  said  that  he  had  nothing  but  the 
students  and  their  appetites  to  begin  a  boarding 
department  with.  However,  they  got  busy,  dug 
a  large  amount  of  earth  from  beneath  Porter  Hall, 
and  opened  this  basement  up  for  a  dining  room. 
They  had  no  dishes,  no  knives  and  forks  to  speak 
of,  at  first;  they  had  poor  arrangements  of  every 
kind.  And  they  had  bad  luck.  Something  went 
wrong  almost  every  day  at  first.  They  would  spill 
the  soup,  burn  the  meat,  or  leave  the  salt  out  of 
the  bread.  Meals  were  served  with  no  sort  of 
regularity. 

Washington  says  that  one  morning  he  was  at 
the  dining  room  when  everything  went  wrong. 
The  breakfast  was  a  failure.  One  of  the  girls  who 
failed  to  get  any  breakfast  went  to  the  well  to  get 
a  drink  of  water,  and  found  the  well  rope  broken. 
Washington  heard  her  say:  "You  can't  even  get 
water  to  drink  at  this  school."  1  He  says  that 
remark  came  nearer  discouraging  him  than  any- 
thing that  ever  happened  to  him. 

He  may  have  been  discouraged,  but  he  kept  on, 
and  in  a  little  while  things  were  coming  out  all 
right.  And  to-day,  one  of  the  greatest  sights  at 
Tuskegee  is  the  great  dining  hall  with  its  white 
tablecloths,   napkins,    and  vases   of   flowers,  with 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  p.  161. 


64  BOOKER  T.  WASHINGTON 

elegant  meals  served  in  excellent  style  and  order 
and  on  time. 

The  next  thing  was  rooms  for  the  boarders. 
Students  were  coming  from  a  distance.  There 
was  no  place  for  them  at  the  school.  Besides, 
Washington  wanted  them  at  the  school  so  that 
he  could  help  them  learn  best  how  to  keep 
their  rooms  and  live  as  folks  ought  to  live.  They 
used  the  cabins  first  for  sleeping  quarters,  but 
they  had  almost  no  furniture.  They  made  mat- 
tresses of  pine  needles.  Their  bedclothes  were 
so  scant  the  first  winter  that  several  were  frost- 
bitten. 

Soon  a  good  house  was  built,  however,  for  all 
the  students,  and  now  they  began  to  live  as  people 
ought.  Among  other  things,  Washington  insisted 
that  they  use  toothbrushes.  He  said  that  perhaps 
no  one  thing  meant  more  in  the  real  training  of  the 
negro  than  the  proper  use  of  this  article.  He  went 
from  room  to  room  himself  to  see  whether  the  stu- 
dents had  them.  "We  found  one  room,"  he  says, 
' '  that  contained  three  girls  who  had  recently  arrived 
at  the  school.  When  I  asked  them  if  they  had  tooth- 
brushes, one  of  the  girls  replied,  pointing  to  a 
brush,  'Yes,  sir,  that  is  our  brush.  We  bought  it 
together  yesterday.'  It  did  not  take  them  long 
to  learn  a  different  lesson."  1 

In  many  ways,  he  was  able  to  help  these  students 
learn  the  proper  ways  of  living  —  how  to  sleep 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  p.  175. 


STRENUOUS   DAYS 


65 


properly,  how  to  care  for  their  bodies,  and  how  to 
take  care  of  their  clothes. 

This  second  year  of  the  school  was  truly  a 
strenuous  one  in  clearing  land,  raising  a  crop, 
making  bricks,  building  Porter  Hall,  starting  a 
boarding  department  and  a  rooming  department. 


Class  in  Physical  Training  at  Tuskegee 

Everybody  had  been  busy  doing  good  work,  and 
everybody  was  happy.  They  were  making  a  great 
beginning. 

A  very  important  event  of  this  year  was  the 
marriage  of  Washington  to  Fannie  M.  Smith. 
They  had  known  each  other  back  in  Maiden, 
and,  as  soon  as  Washington's  work  was  well  begun, 
they  were  married.    She  lived  only  two  years  after 


66  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

her  marr.'age,  dying  in  1884,  and  leaving  a  daugh- 
ter, Portia  M.  Washington.  Several  years  later 
Washington  married  Olivia  Davidson,  the  teacher 
who  had  been  associated  with  him  in  the  school 
almost  from  the  first,  and  who  had  done  so  much 
to  help  him  in  getting  the  school  started. 


CHAPTER   IX 

RAISING   MONEY   FOR   TUSKEGEE 

Tuskegee  grew  rapidly  and  steadily.  Students 
began  to  pour  in  from  all  parts  of  the  country. 
Girls  were  coming  as  well  as  boys.  It  was  abso- 
lutely necessary  to  find  some  place  for  these  stu- 
dents to  live  and  carry  on  their  school  work. 
Tuskegee  Institute  had  no  money.  You  will  re- 
member that  the  Legislature  of  Alabama  appro- 
priated two  thousand  dollars  a  year  for  the  pay- 
ment of  teachers,  but  gave  nothing  for  buildings  or 
land  or  equipment.  So  if  new  buildings  were  to  be 
erected,  it  meant  that  the  money  would  have  to 
be  raised  by  some  other  means.  This  was  not  a 
church  school,  and  it  could  not,  therefore,  appeal 
to  any  religious  denomination  for  help.  There 
was  only  one  way  to  secure  funds  for  its  develop- 
ment and  growth  and  that  was  by  going  out  and 
asking  people  directly  for  aid. 

Washington  did  not  like  to  do  this,  but,  recog- 
nizing the  necessity  for  it,  he  went  bravely  ahead. 
And  perhaps  no  man  was  ever  more  successful  in 
this  work  than  he  was.  President  Charles  W. 
Eliot,  of  Harvard  University,  had  to  raise  money 
in  the  same  way  for  Harvard.  He  was  so  success- 
ful that  it  was  said  of  him,  "When  he  goes  to  rich 
men  they  just   throw   up   their  hands   and   say, 

67 


68  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

'Don't  shoot!  How  much  do  you  want?"  And 
President  Eliot  said  that  Washington  could  beat 
him  raising  money. 

Before  Washington's  death  in  1915.it  required 
from  $250,000  to  $300,000  a  year  to  run  Tuskegee. 
That  is  a  big  sum  of  money.  A  very  large  part 
of  it  had  to  be  raised  by  personal  solicitation. 
And  it  had  to  be  raised  almost  entirely  in  the 
North.  This  meant  that  Washington  had  to 
spend  a  large  part  of  his  time  away  from  Tuskegee, 
traveling  over  the  country,  making  speeches,  and 
talking  to  individual  men.  It  was  hard  work, 
and  it  took  a  great  deal  of  strength  and  effort 
as  well  as  time.  He  had  many  remarkable  experi- 
ences. He  met  many  great  and  good  people,  who 
were  glad  to  help  him.  He  had  an  opportunity 
to  tell  them  about  his  school  and  about  his  people 
in  the  South ;  and  an  opportunity  to  hear  this  re- 
markable man  was  given  to  many  people. 

This  is  the  way  he  was  led  to  undertake  this 
work.  When  the  girls  began  coming  to  school, 
they  had  to  have  a  dormitory.  The  boys  had 
been  staying  in  the  attic  of  Porter  Hall,  living 
in  the  shanty,  or  boarding  in  town.  But  this  would 
not  do  for  the  girls.  They  must  have  different 
accommodations.  The  boys  ought  to  have,  but 
the  girls  must  have  better  surroundings.  So  they 
proceeded  to  plan  a  dormitory.  They  did  not  have 
any  money  with  which  to  build  a  house.  It  was 
just  like  starting  Porter  Hall.    But  they  said  they 


RAISING   MONEY 


69 


could  at  least  plan  the  kind  of  building  they  would 
build  if  they  had  the  money.  They  made  plans 
for  a  building  that  would  cost  ten  thousand  dol- 
lars, and  named  it  Alabama  Hall.  But  that  Ala- 
bama Hall  was  on  paper  only  and  in  the  minds  of 
folks;   so  they  could  not  use  it  very  well. 


White  Hall  (Girls'  dormitory),  Chapel  (rear),  Tatum  Hall  (right), 
Tuskegee  Institute 


Then  an  interesting  thing  happened.  Have 
you  noticed  how  often  something  interesting 
turned  up  with  Washington?  Perhaps  there  is  a 
good  reason  for  it.  u  Nothing  ever  comes  to  one, 
that  is  worth  having,  except  as  a  result  of  hard 
work,"  Washington  himself  has  said.  It  was  not 
just  an  accident  after  all  that  these  good  things 


70  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

were  happening.  It  was  because  Washington  by 
his  work  and  his  good  sense  had  made  lasting 
impressions  upon  people  who  were  in  positions  to 
give  him  help. 

This  is  what  happened.  While  thinking  about 
how  he  could  get  the  ten  thousand  dollars  for 
Alabama  Hall,  he  received  a  letter  from  General 
Armstrong,  asking  if  he  would  agree  to  go  with 
him  on  a  tour  of  the  North;  if  so,  to  come  to 
Hampton  at  once.  Washington  was  delighted 
and  accepted  the  invitation.  To  his  great  surprise 
he  found  that  General  Armstrong  had  planned  to 
take  a  quartette  of  singers  from  Hampton  and  go 
himself  with  Washington  on  a  tour  of  the  North 
in  the  interests  of  Tuskegee.  Washington  thought 
the  trip  was  planned  for  Hampton,  of  course, 
and,  when  he  found  that  General  Armstrong  had 
been  so  unselfish  as  to  plan  it  for  him,  he  was  over- 
come with  gratitude. 

They  had  a  great  trip.  General  Armstrong  had 
Washington  do  most  of  the  speaking.  "Give  them 
an  idea  for  every  word,"  he  said  to  Washington 
as  they  started.  And  Washington  did.  It  was 
on  this  trip  that  Washington  first  introduced 
Tuskegee  to  the  people  of  the  North,  and  that  the 
people  first  got  acquainted  with  Washington. 
When  he  returned  from  this  trip,  he  was  able  to 
begin  work  on  Alabama  Hall,  and  it  was  soon 
completed  and  paid  for.  From  this  time  on 
Washington  went   North  a  great  deal  to  speak 


RAISING   MONEY  71 

publicly  and  to  talk  privately  to  men  about  the 
needs  of  Tuskegee. 

He  met  a  great  many  rich  men.  He  had  many 
interesting  experiences  with  them.  He  did  not 
"beg"  from  them.  He  says  he  always  followed 
two  simple  rules  in  this  work:  first,  to  do  his  full 
duty  in  presenting  the  needs  of  the  school,  and, 
second,  not  to  worry  about  the  results.  He  found 
these  rich  men  unlike  what  he  had  expected.  He 
said  they  were  among  the  best  and  kindest  and 
most  generous  people  in  the  world.  While  he  some- 
times received  discourteous  treatment,  as  a  rule 
he  was  gladly  received  and  treated  with  great 
respect,  and  help  was  gladly  given. 

Three  of  the  rich  men  who  helped  Washington 
a  great  deal  were:  Collis  P.  Huntington,  the  great 
railroad  builder;  H.  H.  Rogers,  of  the  Standard 
Oil  Company,  and  Andrew  Carnegie,  the  philan- 
thropist, who  had  made  a  fortune  in  the  steel  in- 
dustry. Washington  says  that  the  first  time  he 
interviewed  Mr.  Huntington  he  received  a  dona- 
tion of  two  dollars.  Two  dollars  from  a  multi- 
millionaire! But  the  last  donation  he  received 
from  Mr.  Huntington  was  a  check  for  fifty  thou- 
sand dollars.  And  between  the  two  gifts  there  had 
been  gifts  of  many  thousands.  Mr.  Rogers  also 
gave  many  thousands  of  dollars  and  helped  par- 
ticularly in  the  great  extension  work  of  the  college. 

The  most  liberal  giver  was  Andrew  Carnegie. 
As  soon  as  Carnegie  heard  of  the  work  that  Wash- 


72 


BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 


ington  was  doing,  he  sent  for  him  to  come  to  New 
York  City.  The  result  was  that  Carnegie  gave  him 
fifteen  thousand  dollars  with  which  to  build  a 
library.  Washington  and  his  coworkers  spent  a 
great  deal  of  time  working  out  the  plans  for  this 
building.     All  the  work  was  done  by  the  students 


John  A.  Andrew  Memorial  Hospital,  Tuskegee  Institute 

of  Tuskegee.  When  it  was  completed,  Carnegie 
was  amazed  that  such  a  beautiful  and  useful  build- 
ing had  been  built  for  that  sum  of  money.  It 
convinced  him  that  these  people  could  be  trusted 
to  spend  money  wisely.  He  therefore  determined 
to  give  a  large  sum  to  the  school.  Thus  it  hap- 
pened, in  1903,  that  the  President  of  the  Board  of 
Trustees  of  Tuskegee  received  the  following  letter: 


RAISING  MONEY  73 

New  York,  April  17,  1903. 
My  dear  Mr.  Baldwin: 

I  have  instructed  Mr.  Franks,  Secretary,  to  de- 
liver to  you  as  Trustee  of  Tuskegee  $600,000  of  5  per 
cent  U.  S.  Steel  Co.  bonds  to  complete  the  Endow- 
ment Fund  as  per  circular. 

One  condition  only  ■ —  the  revenue  of  one  hun- 
dred and  fifty  thousand  of  these  bonds  is  to  be 
subject  to  Booker  Washington's  order  to  be  used  by 
him  first  for  his  wants,  and  those  of  his  family  during 
his  life  or  the  life  of  his  widow.  If  any  surplus  is 
left  he  can  use  it  for  Tuskegee.  I  wish  that  great 
and  good  man  to  be  free  from  pecuniary  cares  that 
he  may  devote  himself  wholly  to  his  great  mission. 

To  me  he  seems  one  of  the  foremost  of  living 
men,  because  his  work  is  unique,  —  the  Modern 
A/[oses,  who  leads  his  race  and  lifts  it  through 
Education  to  ever  better  and  higher  things  than  a 
land  overflowing  with  milk  and  honey.  History 
is  to  know  two  Washingtons,  —  one  white,  the  other 
black,  both  fathers  of  their  people.  I  am  satisfied 
that  the  serious  race  question  of  the  South  is  to  be 
solved  wisely  only  by  following  Booker  Washing- 
ton's policy,  which  he  seems  to  have  been  especially 
born- — a  slave  among  slaves  —  to  establish,  and, 
even  in  his  own  day,  greatly  to  advance. 

So  glad  to  be  able  to  assist  this  good  work  in 
which  you  and  others  are  engaged. 

Yours  truly, 
(Signed)  Andrew  Carnegie. 
To  Mr.  William  H.  Baldwin,  Jr., 
New  York  City,  N.  Y.1 

1  "Booker  T.  Washington:    Builder  of  a  Civilization,"  by  Scott  and 
Stowe,  pp.  258-259. 


74 


BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 


One  other  name  must  be  mentioned,  and  that  is 
Julius  Rosenwald  of  Chicago.  Air.  Rosen wald 
not  only  gave  large  sums  himself  -  -  and  is  still 
giving  enormous  amounts  not  only  to  Tuskegee 
but  to  the  cause  of  negro  education  throughout 
the  South  —  but  frequently  left  his  own  business 


Class  in  Photography,  Tuskegee  Institute 

and  helped  to  raise  money  among  his  friends  for 
Tuskegee. 

There  were  many  large  gifts  from  many  men 
and  women,  all  of  whom  cannot  be  mentioned  here 
of  course,  but  most  of  the  money  that  was  given 
to  Tuskegee  came  in  small  amounts  from  a  large 
number     of     people,  —  from     churches,     Sunday 


RAISING   MONEY  75 

schools,  missionary  societies,  and  other  organiza- 
tions; from  preachers,  teachers,  lawyers,  doctors, 
farmers  —  from  every  class  of  people  came  gifts, 
sometimes  large  and  sometimes  small.  All  the 
graduates  of  Tuskegee  were  loyal  and  gave  some- 
thing, however  small  the  amount  might  be  The 
Alabama  Legislature  gave  more  and  more  as  the 
school  grew.  The  Slater  Fund  and  the  Peabody 
Fund  also  began  to  make  annual  contributions  to 
the  school. 

It  was  through  all  these  channels  that  the  money 
came  pouring  ;nto  Tuskegee  in  such  amounts  that 
it  was  poss'ble  for  it  to  grow  and  develop  in  a 
remarkable  way.  Building  after  building  went 
up.  New  students  came.  New  equipment  was 
purchased.  Additional  faculty  members  were 
secured.  And  the  school  grew  in  size  and  useful- 
ness and  in  favor  in  the  eyes  of  the  people. 


CHAPTER   X 

MAKING    SPEECHES 

Frederick  Douglass  and  Booker  Washington 
rank  as  the  greatest  orators  the  negro  race  has 
ever  produced.  This  is  a  high  place  to  occupy, 
for  the  race  has  produced  many  remarkable 
speakers. 

Douglass  was  the  great  spokesman  for  the  race 
just  before  the  Civil  War  and  during  the  trouble- 
some days  of  reconstruction.  Washington  began 
his  career  just  at  the  time  that  Douglass  ended 
his.  Douglass  was  a  very  eloquent  man;  perhaps 
more  eloquent  at  times  than  Washington.  On  the 
other  hand,  Washington  was  a  better  educated 
man  than  Douglass  and  probably  had  a  more 
lasting  influence  upon  his  generation. 

Booker  Washington  made  thousands  of  speeches 
in  his  life.  He  spoke  to  white  and  black;  in  the 
North  and  in  the  South;  in  Europe  as  well  as  in 
America.  He  spoke  in  churches;  at  school  com- 
mencements; at  conventions;  at  educational  and 
religious  meetings;  at  county  fairs;  and  to  every 
kind  and  condition  of  people.  He  spoke  before 
kings  and  presidents;  he  spoke  to  the  lowliest 
men  of  his  own  race  in  the  heart  of  the  black  belt 
in  Alabama.     It  is  a  wonderful  thing  to  be  an 

76 


MAKING   SPEECHES  77 

orator;  to  speak  to  men  and  women  in  such  a  way 
that  they  will  be  helped  and  inspired  and  made 
happier  and  more  useful. 

When  Washington  was  at  Hampton,  he  began 
to  learn  the  art  of  speaking.  You  remember  how 
he  organized  a  debating  society  which  met  for  the 
twenty  minutes  they  had  between  supper  and  time 
to  begin  work.  You  remember  how  he  spoke  and 
spoke  at  these  meetings,  doing  his  best  to  learn 
how  to  express  himself  well.  One  of  his  teachers, 
Miss  Mackie,  knew  of  his  ambition  to  become  a 
good  speaker,  and  she  gave  him  a  great  deal  of 
help,  teaching  him  how  to  stand,  how  to  pronounce 
his  words,  and  how  to  control  his  voice  and  ges- 
tures. By  much  hard  work  he  came  to  be  the  best 
speaker  among  the  boys  at  Hampton. 

You  will  recall,  too,  how  General  Armstrong 
invited  him  to  deliver  the  alumni  address  in  1879, 
and  what  a  big  success  he  made  of  that.  All  this 
time  he  was  speaking  at  Sunday  schools,  at 
churches,  at  educational  meetings,  and  everywhere 
he  had  an  opportunity.  His  trip  North  with 
General  Armstrong  gave  him  much  valuable 
experience. 

The  first  speech  that  he  made  that  attracted 
the  attention  of  all  the  people  was  at  the  National 
Education  Association,  in  Madison,  Wis.  The 
most  important  thing  he  said  in  this  speech  was 
that  the  "  whole  future  of  the  negro  rested  largely 
upon  the  question  as  to  whether  or  not  he  should 


78  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

make  himself,  through  his  skill,  intelligence,  and 
character,  of  such  undeniable  value  to  the  com- 
munity in  which  he  lived  that  the  community 
could  not  dispense  with  his  presence."  He  said 
that  any  one  who  "learned  to  do  something  better 
than  anybody  else  —  learned  to  do  a  common 
thing  in  an  uncommon  manner  —  had  solved  his 
problem,  regardless  of  the  color  of  his  skin."  *  He 
also  said  that  the  two  races  ought  to  be  brought 
closer  together  and  cultivate  the  most  cordial 
and  friendly  relations,  rather  than  become  bitter 
toward  each  other. 

But  the  greatest  speech  of  Washington's  life 
was  the  Atlanta  speech.  In  the  year  1895  the 
people  of  Georgia  determined  to  hold  a  great 
Cotton  States  Exposition,  in  Atlanta,  which  would 
set  forth  the  progress  of  the  South  since  the  Civil 
War.  In  order  to  make  the  exposition  a  great 
success  it  was  necessary  to  have  the  financial 
assistance  of  Congress.  So  a  committee  was  ap- 
pointed to  go  to  Washington  to  confer  with  a 
committee  from  Congress.  Booker  Washington 
was  appointed  on  this  Georgia  committee;  and 
his  speech  in  Washington  before  the  Congressional 
committee  was  one  of  unusual  force.  Many  said 
it  was  the  best  speech  made.  Congress  gave  the 
assistance  asked. 

When  the  authorities  came  to  plan  the  exposi- 
tion  in   detail,    they   decided   to   have   a    Negro 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  p.  202. 


MAKING   SPEECHES  79 

Division.  The  negroes  were  asked  to  take  part, 
and  they  gladly  agreed  to  do  so  They  built  one 
of  the  best  buildings  on  the  grounds.  This  building 
was  planned  by  a  negro  architect  and  was  erected 
entirely  by  negro  labor.  It  contained  exhibits 
prepared  altogether  by  negroes.  It  was  one  of  the 
most  interesting  parts  of  the  entire  exposition. 

When  the  exposition  was  formally  opened  in 
September,  1895,  Booker  Washington  was  invited 
to  make  an  address  as  a  representative  of  the 
negro  race.  James  Creelman,  a  noted  newspaper 
man,  the  correspondent  of  the  New  York  World, 
heard  that  speech,  and  he  wrote  to  the  World  about 
it.     This  is  what  he  wrote: 

"Mrs.  Thompson,  one  of  the  other  speakers  on  the  pro- 
gram, had  hardly  taken  her  seat,  when  all  eyes  were  turned 
on  a  tall,  tawny  negro,  sitting  in  the  front  row  of  the  plat- 
form. It  was  Professor  Booker  T.  Washington,  President 
of  the  Tuskegee  (Alabama)  Normal  and  Industrial  Institute, 
who  must  rank  from  this  time  forth  as  the  foremost  man  of 
his  race  in  America.  Gilmore's  Band  played  the  'Star- 
spangled  Banner,'  and  the  audience  cheered.  The  tune 
changed  to  'Dixie'  and  the  audience  roared  with  shrill 
'hi-yi's.'  Again  the  music  changed,  this  time  to  'Yankee 
Doodle,'  and  the  clamor  lessened. 

"All  this  time  the  eyes  of  the  thousands  present  looked 
straight  at  the  negro  orator.  A  strange  thing  was  to  happen. 
A  black  man  was  to  speak  for  his  people,  with  none  to  in- 
terrupt him.  As  Professor  Washington  strode  to  the  edge 
of  the  stage,  the  low,  descending  sun  shot  fiery  rays  through 
the  windows  into  his  face.  A  great  shout  greeted  him.  He 
turned  his  head  to  avoid  the  blinding  light,  and  moved  about 


80  BOOKER  T.  WASHINGTON 

the  platform  for  relief.  Then  he  turned  his  wonderful 
countenance  to  the  sun  without  a  blink  of  the  eyelids,  and 
began  to  talk. 

"There  was  a  remarkable  figure;  tall,  bony,  straight  as 
a  vSioux  chief,  high  forehead,  straight  nose,  heavy  jaws,  and 
strong,  determined  mouth,  with  big  white  teeth,  piercing 
eyes,  and  a  commanding  manner.  The  sinews  stood  out 
on  his  bronzed  neck,  and  his  muscular  right  arm  swung  high 
in  the  air,  with  a  lead  pencil  grasped  in  the  clinched  brown 
fist.  His  big  feet  were  planted  squarely,  with  the  heels 
together  and  the  toes  turned  out.  His  voice  rang  out  clear 
and  true,  and  he  paused  impressively  as  he  made  each  point. 
Within  ten  minutes  the  multitude  was  in  an  uproar  of  en- 
thusiasm —  handkerchiefs  were  waved,  canes  were  flourished, 
hats  were  tossed  in  the  air.  The  fairest  women  of  Georgia 
stood  up  and  cheered.  It  was  as  if  the  orator  had  bewitched 
them. 

"And  when  he  held  his  dusky  hand  high  above  his  head, 
with  the  fingers  stretched  wide  apart,  and  said  to  the  white 
people  of  the  South,  on  behalf  of  his  race,  '  In  all  things  that 
are  purely  social  we  can  be  as  separate  as  the  fingers,  yet  one 
as  the  hand  in  all  things  essential  to  mutual  progress,'  the 
great  wave  of  sound  dashed  itself  against  the  walls,  and 
the  whole  audience  was  on  its  feet  in  a  delir'um  of  ap- 
plause. 

"I  have  heard  the  great  orators  of  many  countries,  but 
not  even  Gladstone  himself  could  have  pleaded  a  cause  with 
more  consummate  power  than  did  this  angular  negro,  stand- 
ing in  a  nimbus  of  sunshine,  surrounded  by  the  men  who 
once  fought  to  keep  his  race  in  bondage.  The  roar  might 
swell  ever  so  high,  but  the  expression  of  his  earnest  face  never 
changed. 

"A  ragged,  ebony  giant,  squatted  on  the  floor  in  one  of 
the  aisles,  watched  the  orator  with  burning  eyes  and  tremu- 
lous face  until  the  supreme  burst  of  applause  came,  and  then 


MAKING  SPEECHES  81 

the  tears  ran  down  his  face.     Most  of  the  negroes  in  the 
audience  were  crying,  perhaps  without  knowing  just  why. 

"At  the  close  of  the  speech  Governor  Bulloch  rushed 
across  the  stage  and  seized  the  orator's  hand.  Another 
shout  greeted  this  demonstration,  and  for  a  few  minutes 
the  two  men  stood  facing  each  other,  hand  in  hand."  l 

It  was  a  wonderful  speech.  It  contained  much 
good  advice  both  to  the  whites  and  to  the  negroes. 
It  was  fair  to  both.  As  Clark  Howell,  editor  of 
the  Atlanta  Constitution,  said,  "It  was  a  platform 
upon  which  both  races,  black  and  white,  could 
stand  with  full  justice  to  each  other."  2  In  the 
speech  he  told  the  following  story:  "A  ship  lost 
at  sea  for  many  days  suddenly  sighted  a  friendly 
vessel.  From  the  mast  of  the  unfortunate  vessel 
was  seen  a  signal:  '  Water,  water;  we  die  of  thirst.' 
The  answer  from  the  friendly  vessel  at  once 
came  back,  'Cast  down  your  buckets  where  you 
are.'  A  second  time  the  signal,  'Water,  water, 
send  us  water,'  ran  up  from  the  distressed  vessel, 
and  was  answered,  '  Cast  down  your  buckets  where 
you  are.'  And  a  third  and  a  fourth  signal  for  water 
was  answered,  'Cast  down  your  buckets  where 
you  are.'  The  captain  of  the  distressed  vessel, 
at  last  heeding  the  injunction,  cast  down  his 
bucket,  and  it  came  up  full  of  fresh,  sparkling 
water  from  the  mouth  of  the  Amazon  River." 
Washington  then  appealed  to  his  own  people  to 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  pp.  239-240. 

2  Ibid.,  p.  226. 


82  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

"cast  down  their  buckets  where  they  were,"  by 
making  friends  with  their  white  neighbors  in  every 
manly  way,  by  training  themselves  where  they 
were  in  agriculture,  in  mechanics,  in  commerce, 
instead  of  trying  to  better  their  condition  by  im- 
migration. And,  finally,  to  the  white  Southern 
people,  he  appealed  to  "cast  down  their  buckets 
where  they  were,"  by  using  and  training  the 
negroes  whom  they  knew  rather  than  seeking  to 
import  laborers  whom  they  did  not  know.  l 

Frederick  Douglass  had  died  only  a  few  months 
before  this  great  speech  was  made.  At  once  from 
all  parts  of  the  country  came  the  statement,  "Here 
is  the  man  who  will  take  the  place  of  Douglass 
as  leader  of  the  negro  race."  And  from  that  time 
on,  Booker  Washington  was  the  accepted  leader 
of  his  people  in  this  country. 

He  was  immediately  called  upon  to  speak  in  all 
parts  of  the  country.  He  was  offered  big  sums  of 
money  to  lecture.  One  speaker's  bureau  offered 
him  fifty  thousand  dollars  a  year.  He  refused  all 
these  offers  of  money,  saying  that  he  must  give 
his  time  to  Tuskegee  and  to  the  interests  of  his 
people,  rather  than  try  to  make  money  for  himself. 

Another  of  his  great  speeches  was  made  at 
Cambridge,  Mass.,  in  1896.  Harvard  University, 
the  oldest  and  most  famous  university  in  America, 
conferred  the  honorary  degree  of  master  of  arts 
upon   Mr.   Washington   in    1896.     This  was  the 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  p.  219. 


MAKING  SPEECHES  83 

first  time  in  the  history  of  America  that  a  college 
or  university  of  such  high  standing  had  ever  con- 
ferred an  honorary  degree  upon  a  negro.  Wash  ng- 
ton  says  this  honor  was  the  greatest  surprise  of 
his  life.  At  the  time  the  ceremony  of  conferring 
this  degree  took  place,  he  made  a  speech  that  won 
great  applause  from  the  audience. 

It  is  very  interesting  to  read  Washington's  own 
account  of  his  experiences.  "People  often  ask 
me,"  he  says,  "if  I  feel  nervous  before  speaking, 
or  else  suggest  that,  since  I  speak  so  o  ten,  they 
suppose  I  get  used  to  it.  In  answer  to  this  question 
I  have  to  say  that  I  always  suffer  intensely  from 
nervousness  before  speaking.  More  than  once, 
just  before  I  was  to  make  an  impor  ant  address, 
this  nervous  strain  has  been  so  great  that  I  have 
resolved  never  again  to  speak  in  public.  I  not 
only  feel  nervous  before  speaking,  but  after  I  have 
finished  I  usually  feel  a  sense  of  regret,  because  it 
seems  to  me  as  if  I  had  left  out  of  my  address  the 
best  thing  that  I  had  meant  to  say.  .  .  .  Nothing 
tends  to  throw  me  off  my  balance  so  quickly,  when 
I  am  speaking,  as  to  have  some  one  leave  the  room. 
To  prevent  this,  I  make  up  my  mind,  as  a  rule, 
that  I  will  try  to  make  my  address  so  interesting, 
will  try  to  state  so  many  interest  ng  facts  one  after 
another,  that  no  one  will  leave."  * 

Washington  made  it  a  rule  never  to  say  any- 
thing to  a  Northern  audience  that  he  would  not 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  pp.  242,  244. 


84  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

say  to  a  Southern  audience.  He  also  made  it  a 
rule  never  to  say  to  a  negro  audience  anything 
that  he  would  not  say  to  a  white  audience.  In 
this  honest  and  fair  way  he  kept  close  to  the 
truth,  and  at  the  same  time  never  offended  fair- 
minded  people  of  either  race. 

He  was  a  capital  story-teller,  but  he  did  not 
make  a  practice  of  telling  jokes  and  funny  stories 
in  his  speeches,  just  to  make  people  laugh.  He 
always  had  a  serious  purpose  in  his  stories.  He 
had  two  or  three  stories  that  he  told  frequently, 
because  they  were  so  full  of  meaning.  This  was 
one  of  them:  One  day  he  was  going  along  the 
road,  and  he  met  old  Aunt  Caroline,  with  a  basket 
on  her  head.  He  said,  "Good  morning,  Aunt 
Caroline.  Where  are  you  going  this  morning?" 
And  she  replied,  "Lor'  bless  yer,  Mister  Washing- 
ton, I  dun  bin  where  I's  er  goin."  "And  so,"  he 
would  then  say,  "some  of  the  races  of  the  earth 
have  done  been  where  they  was  er  goin'.  But  the 
negro  race  is  not  one  of  them.  Its  future  lies 
before  it."  1 

Another  of  his  stories  was  about  a  good  old 
negro  who  accompanied  Washington  on  one  of  his 
tours.  At  a  certain  city  they  found  that  they  had 
several  hours  before  the  train  left ;  so  this  old  man 
decided  to  stroll  about  to  see  the  town.  Pres- 
ently,   he   looked   at   his   watch   and   found   that 

1  "Booker  T.  Washington:  Builder  of  a  Civilization,"  by  Scott  and 
Stowe,  p.  30. 


MAKING   SPEECHES  85 

it  was  just  about  time  for  his  train  to  leave,  and 
he  was  some  distance  from  the  station.  He  rushed 
to  a  hack  stand,  and  called  out  to  the  first  driver 
he  came  to,  who  happened  to  be  a  white  man, 
"Hurry  up,  and  take  me  to  the  station;  I's  gotta 
get  the  4:32  train."  To  which  the  white  driver 
replied,  "I  ain't  never  drove  a  nigger  in  my  hack 
yit,  an'  I  ain't  goin'  ter  begin  now.  You  can  git 
a  nigger  driver  ter  take  ye  down."  ! 

To  this  the  old  colored  man  replied  with  per- 
fect good  nature,  "All  right,  my  friend,  we  won't 
have  no  misunderstanding  or  trouble;  I'll  tell 
you  how  we  will  settle  it;  you  jest  hop  in  on  der 
back  seat  an'  do  der  ridin'  an'  I'll  set  in  front  an' 
do  der  drivin'."  In  this  way  they  reached  the 
station  on  good  terms,  and  the  old  man  caught  his 
train.  Like  this  old  negro,  Washington  always 
devoted  his  energies  to  catching  the  train,  and  it 
made  little  difference  to  him  whether  he  sat  on 
the  front  or  back  seat. 

Two  other  speeches  of  Washington  attracted 
wide  attention.  One  of  these  was  delivered  in 
Boston  in  1897,  at  the  time  of  the  dedication  of  a 
monument  to  Robert  Gould  Shaw.  Shaw  was  the 
Colonel  of  the  famous  negro  regiment  of  soldiers 
from  Massachusetts  in  the  Civil  War.  It  was  in 
this  regiment  that  Sergeant  William  H.  Carney 
served,  —  the  man  who  triumphantly  carried  the 

1  "Booker  T.  Washington:  Builder  of  a  Civilization,"  by  Scott  and 
Stowe,  pp.  30-31. 


86  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

flag  in  the  great  battle  of  Fort  Wagner,  and  ex- 
claimed after  the  fight,  "The  old  flag  never  touched 
the  ground ! "  Colonel  Shaw  lost  his  life  in  the  bat- 
tle of  Fort  Wagner,  while  leading  his  negro  regi- 
ment. The  people  of  Boston  erected  a  monument 
to  his  memory,  and  Washington's  speech  at  its  dedi- 
cation was  one  of  the  greatest  he  ever  made. 

One  other  speech  was  delivered  in  Chicago  in 
1898  at  a  great  Peace  Celebration,  following  the 
close  of  the  Spanish-American  War.  There  was 
an  enormous  crowd  —  the  largest  he  ever  spoke 
to,  Washington  says.  There  were  sixteen  thousand 
people  present.  President  McKinley  was  there, 
together  with  several  cabinet  members  and  other 
distinguished  guests.  "The  President  was  sitting 
in  a  box  at  the  right  of  the  stage,"  says  Washing- 
ton. "When  I  addressed  him  I  turned  to  the  box, 
and  as  I  finished  the  sentence  thanking  him  for 
his  generosity,  the  whole  audience  rose  and  cheered 
again  and  again,  waving  hats  and  handkerchiefs 
and  canes,  until  the  President  arose  in  the  box, 
and  bowed  his  acknowledgments.  At  that  the 
enthusiasm  broke  out  again,  and  the  demonstra- 
tion was  almost  indescribable."  * 

The  demands  for  him  to  speak  were  so  great 
that  it  was  impossible  for  him  to  meet  them 
all.  He  often  spoke  three  and  four  times  a  day. 
He  was  away  from  Tuskegee,  making  speeches,  a 
large  part  of  his  time.     He  made  extended  tours, 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  p.  255. 


MAKING  SPEECHES  87 

by  special  train,  all  over  the  states  of  Virginia, 
North  Carolina,  Georgia,  Alabama,  Arkansas, 
Louisiana,  Mississippi,  and  Tennessee.  On  these 
tours  he  spoke  to  thousands  and  thousands  of 
people.  Everywhere  he  went  all  the  people,  white 
and  black,  heard  him  gladly.  The  good  that  this 
man  did  through  his  oratory  cannot  be  overesti- 
mated. 


CHAPTER   XI 

SUCCESS    AS    EDUCATIONAL   LEADER 

Booker  Washington  spent  his  life  in  the  edu- 
cation of  the  negro.  Negroes  of  ability  in  his  day 
usually  became  preachers  or  they  entered  politics. 
The  negro  preacher  had  rendered  a  greater  service 
to  his  people,  perhaps,  than  any  one  else.  Before 
1865,  the  ministry  was  practically  the  only  place 
where  negro  leadership  could  find  expression.  It 
was  much  the  same  way  for  many  years  after  the 
Civil  War.  However,  after  emancipation,  there 
was  an  opportunity  for  leadership  in  politics,  and 
a  great  many  negroes  of  ability  entered  this  field, 
many  of  them  holding  offices. 

Washington  was  urged  by  some  of  his  friends 
to  enter  the  ministry.  Others  urged  him  to  study 
law  and  enter  politics.  Undoubtedly  he  could 
have  made  a  great  success  in  either  of  these  fields 
of  work.  But  from  the  very  beginning  of  his 
education,  he  had  a  strong  conviction  that  his  life 
must  be  spent  in  helping  to  educate  his  people. 

He  felt  that  education  was  the  greatest  need  of 
his  race.  Before  the  war,  it  had  been  against  the 
law  for  a  slave  to  be  taught  from  books.  At  the 
close  of  the  war,  then,  there  w^ere  no  schools,  no 
teachers,   and  no  books.     The  whole  race  could 

88 


EDUCATIONAL   LEADER 


89 


neither  read  nor  write.  The  whole  race  had  had 
no  training  of  any  kind  except  in  agriculture.  It 
is  true  a  few,  but  a  very  few,  had  had  a  little  train- 
ing in  certain  trades  such  as  bricklaying,  black- 
smithing,  and  carpentry.  The  race,  therefore, 
through  no  fault  of  its  own,  was  very  ignorant.  It 
had  never  had  an  opportunity. 


Chemistry  Class,  Tuskegee  Academic  Department 

But  now  that  the  opportunity  had  come  with 
emancipation,  the  entire  race  was  eager  to  learn. 
Old  men  and  old  women,  as  well  as  boys  and  girls, 
began  with  great  zeal  to  learn  to  read  and  write. 
The  race  started  to  school.  It  was  determined  to 
get  an  education,  and  it  was  to  help  in  this  great 


90  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

work  that  Wash  ngton  early  determ'ned  to  devote 
his  life. 

Just  after  the  war  there  was  much  confusion 
and  doubt  about  the  best  plan  to  follow  in  educat- 
ing the  negro.  The  Freedmen's  Bureau  brought 
a  large  number  of  teachers  from  the  North  to 
assist  in  the  task,  and  much  valuable  work  was 
done  in  the  negro  schools  by  these  teachers.  The 
d  fferent  Southern  states  also  began  to  make  pro- 
vision for  the  negro's  education,  by  organizing 
schools,  building  schoolhouses,  and  making  pro- 
vision for  training  teachers. 

There  was  much  difference  of  opinion  as  to  just 
what  should  be  taught  the  negro.  As  a  rule,  the 
plan  followed  was  to  teach  him  just  what  had  been 
taught  in  the  white  schools.  This  meant  that  he 
would  study  reading,  writing,  arithmetic  and 
grammar,  and  later,  Latin,  Greek,  mathematics 
and  literature. 

So  much  of  this  kind  of  teaching  was  done,  and 
it  was  so  poorly  done,  and  it  was  so  poorly  adapted 
to  the  needs  of  the  negro  at  the  time,  that  a  great 
many  people  began  to  doubt  the  wisdom  of  trying 
to  educate  the  negro  at  all.  But  Washington  in- 
sisted that  the  mistake  was  made  in  the  kind  of 
education  they  were  trying  to  give  him.  In  answer 
to  the  question,  "  Does  it  pay  to  educate  the 
negro?"  Washington  often  told  the  story  of  what 
had  taken  place  in  Macon  County,  Alabama, 
the  county  in  which  Tuskegee  is  located.     In  that 


EDUCATIONAL   LEADER  91 

county,  he  and  Mr.  H.  H.  Rogers  decided  to  build, 
with  the  cooperation  of  the  people  themselves,  a 
system  of  excellent  schools,  and  try  out  as 
thoroughly  as  possible  the  question  of  the  effect 
of  education  upon  the  negro,  under  favorable  con- 
ditions. They  put  up  good  schoolhouses,  secured 
good  teachers,  taught  practical  subjects,  and  ran 
the  schools  for  eight  or  nine  months  in  the  year. 

What  was  the  result?  In  a  short  time  people 
began  to  come  from  all  parts  of  the  state  and  out- 
side the  state  to  buy  land  or  to  work  within  reach 
of  these  excellent  schools.  Land  advanced  in 
price.  Desirable  citizens  flocked  in.  Homes  were 
improved.  Good  roads  were  built.  Better  farms 
appeared.  Crime  diminished.  The  sheriff  said 
that  he  practically  had  no  further  use  for  the  jail. 
Cordial  relations  existed  between  the  white  and 
negro  people.  In  every  way  Macon  County  came 
to  be  a  better  place  to  live  in.  The  race  problem 
was  solved  in  that  county.  People  were  happy 
and  prosperous.  They  were  living  clean,  whole- 
some, contented  lives.  The  whole  problem  of 
living  was,  in  a  large  measure,  solved.  And  it  was 
all  due  to  education  of  the  people,  and  education 
of  the  right  kind.  What  was  good  for  Macon 
County,  Alabama,  would  be  good  for  every  county 
in  the  country. 

Washington's  ideas  of  education  were  very 
simple.  He  had  studied  carefully  the  needs  of  his 
people.    What  he  wanted  was  a  system  of  educa- 


92  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

tion  that  would  help  people  directly  and  im- 
mediately ;  that  would  enable  them  to  make  better 
crops;  build  better  homes;  wear  better  clothes; 
eat  better  food;  live  cleaner  and  purer  and  hap- 
pier lives.  He  wanted  his  people  to  learn  to  live; 
and  he  believed  the  school  was  the  place  to  learn 
that  lesson. 


Truck  Gardening,  Tuskegee  Institute 

He  wanted  the  children  to  study  practical  things; 
the  things  they  needed.  He  thought,  therefore, 
that  the  school  ought  to  be  very  closely  related 
to  life.  His  idea  was  that  that  school  was  best 
which  turned  out  students  who  could  earn  their 
own  living  at  once;  who  had  the  ability  to  take 
care  of  themselves  in  whatever  environment  they 
happened  to  be;   and  who  had  genuine  character. 


EDUCATIONAL   LEADER  93 

"My  experience  has  taught  me,"  he  says,  "that 
the  surest  way  to  success  in  education,  and  in  any 
other  line  for  that  matter,  is  to  stick  close  to  the 
common  and  familiar  things  —  things  that  con- 
cern the  greater  part  of  the  people  the  greater  part 
of  the  time."  : 

It  was  this  belief  in  the  close  relation  between 
school  and  life  that  caused  him  to  have  his  stu- 
dents, at  the  beginning  of  the  building  of  Tuskegee, 
cut  down  the  trees,  plant  the  crops,  make  the 
bricks,  build  the  buildings,  cook  the  food,  care 
for  the  dormitories,  look  after  the  live  stock,  and 
do  everything  that  was  to  be  done  about  the  place. 
He  wanted  his  students  to  learn  to  do  well  all 
these  tasks  that  they  would  face  in  later  life.  And 
he  also  wanted  them  to  learn  that  it  was  a  per- 
fectly honorable  and  dignified  and  sensible  thing 
to  labor,  to  work,  to  do  anything  that  was  honest 
and  useful. 

Perhaps  there  is  no  better  way  of  understanding 
Washington's  ideas  of  education  and  just  what  he 
was  striving  to  do  at  Tuskegee  than  to  describe 
the  commencement  exercises  at  this  school. 

"On  the  platform  before  the  audience  is  a  mini- 
ature engine  to  which  steam  has  been  piped,  a 
miniature  frame  house  in  course  of  construction, 
and  a  piece  of  brick  wall  in  process  of  erection. 
A  young  man  in  jumpers  comes  on  the  platform, 
starts  the  engine  and  blows  the  whistle.     Where- 

1  "My  Larger  Education,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  p.  139. 


94  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

upon  young  men  and  women  come  hurrying  from 
all  directions,  and  each  turns  to  his  or  her  ap- 
pointed task.  A  young  carpenter  completes  the 
little  house,  a  young  mason  finishes  the  laying  of 
the  brick  wall,  a  young  farmer  leads  forth  a  cow 
and  milks  her  in  full  view  of  the  audience,  a  sturdy 
blacksmith  shoes  a  horse,  and,  after  this  patient, 
educative  animal  has  been  shod,  he  is  turned  over 
to  a  representative  of  the  veterinary  division  to 
have  his  teeth  filed.  At  the  same  time,  on  the 
opposite  side  of  the  platform  one  of  the  girl  stu- 
dents is  having  a  dress  fitted  by  one  of  her  class- 
mates, who  is  a  dressmaker.  She  at  length  walks 
proudly  from  the  platform  in  her  completed  new 
gown,  while  the  young  dressmaker  looks  anxiously 
after  to  make  sure  that  it  'hangs  right  behind.' 
Other  girls  are  doing  washing  and  ironing  with 
the  drudgery  removed  in  accordance  with  ad- 
vanced Tuskegee  methods.  Still  others  are  hard 
at  wcrk  on  hats,  mats,  and  dresses,  while  boys  from 
the  tailoring  department  sit  cross-legged  working 
on  suits  and  uniforms.  In  the  background  are 
arranged  the  finest  specimens  which  scientific 
agriculture  has  produced  on  the  farm  and  me- 
chanical skill  has  turned  out  in  the  shop.  The 
pumpkin,  potatoes,  corn,  cotton,  and  other  agri- 
cultural products  predominate,  because  agriculture 
is  the  chief  industry  at  Tuskegee,  just  as  it  is  among 
the  negro  people  of  the  South. 

"This  form  of  commencement  exercise  is  one  of 


EDUCATIONAL   LEADER 


95 


Booker  Washington's  contributions  to  education 
which  has  been  widely  copied  by  schools  for  whites 
as  well  as  blacks.  That  it  appeals  to  his  own  people 
is  eloquently  attested  by  the  people  themselves, 
who  come  in  ever-greater  numbers  as  the  com- 
mencement days  recur.     At  three  o'clock  in  the 


,  ■• 


Domestic  Science  Class  at  Tuskegee 

morning  of  this  great  day,  vehicles  of  every  de- 
scription, each  loaded  to  capacity  with  men, 
women,  and  children,  begin  to  roll  in,  in  an  un- 
broken line  which  sometimes  extends  along  the 
road  for  three  miles.  Some  of  the  teachers  at 
times  objected  to  turning  a  large  area  of  the  In- 
stitute  grounds   into   a   hitching-post   station   for 


96  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

the  horses  and  mules  of  this  great  multitude,  but 
to  all  such  objections  Mr.  Washington  replied, 
'This  place  belongs  to  the  people  and  not  to  us.' 
Less  than  a  third  of  these  eight  or  nine  thousand 
people  are  able  to  crowd  into  the  chapel  to  see 
the  actual  graduation  exercises;  but  all  can  see 
the  graduation  procession  as  it  marches  through 
the  grounds  to  the  chapel,  and  all  are  shown 
through  the  shops  and  over  the  farm  and  through 
the  special  agricultural  exhibits,  and  even  through 
the  offices,  including  that  of  the  principal.  It  is 
significant  of  the  respect  in  which  people  hold  the 
Institute,  and  in  which  they  held  Booker  Wash- 
ington, that  in  all  these  years  there  has  never 
been  on  these  occasions  a  single  instance  of  drunk- 
enness or  disorderly  conduct."  l 

"One  of  our  students  in  his  commencement 
oration  last  May  gave  a  description  of  how  he 
planted  and  raised  an  acre  of  cabbages.  Piled 
high  upon  the  platform  by  his  side  were  some  of  the 
largest  and  finest  cabbages  I  have  ever  seen.  He 
told  how  and  where  he  had  obtained  the  seed; 
he  described  his  method  of  preparing  and  enrich- 
ing the  soil,  of  working  the  land,  and  harvesting 
the  crop;  and  he  summed  up  by  giving  the  cost 
of  the  whole  operation.  In  the  course  of  his  ac- 
count of  this  comparatively  simple  operation,  this 
student  had  made  use  of  much  that  he  had  learned 

1  "Booker  T.  Washington:  Builder  of  a  Civilization,"  by  Scott  and 
Stowe,  pp.  57-59- 


EDUCATIONAL   LEADER  97 

in  composition,  grammar,  mathematics,  chemistry, 
and  agriculture.  He  had  not  merely  woven  into 
his  narrative  all  these  various  elements  that  I 
have  referred  to,  but  he  had  given  the  audience 
(which  was  made  up  largely  of  colored  farmers 
from  the  surrounding  country)  some  useful  and 
practical  information  in  regard  to  a  subject  which 
they  understood  and  were  interested  in.  I  wish 
that  any  one  who  does  not  believe  it  possible  to 
make  a  subject  like  cabbages  interesting  in  a 
commencement  oration  could  have  heard  the 
hearty  cheers  which  greeted  the  speaker  when,  at 
the  close  of  his  speech,  he  held  up  one  of  the  largest 
cabbages  on  the  platform  for  the  audience  to  look 
at  and  admire.  As  a  matter  of  fact  there  is  just  as 
much  that  is  interesting,  strange,  mysterious  and 
wonderful;  just  as  much  to  be  learned  that  is 
edifying,  broadening,  and  refining  in  a  cabbage 
as  there  is  in  a  page  of  Latin.  There  is,  however, 
this  distinction;  it  will  make  very  little  difference 
to  the  world  whether  one  negro  boy,  more  or  less, 
learns  to  construe  a  page  of  Latin.  On  the  other 
hand,  as  soon  as  one  negro  boy  has  been  taught  to 
apply  thought  and  study  and  ideas  to  the  growing 
of  cabbages,  he  has  started  a  process  which,  if  it 
goes  on  and  continues,  will  eventually  transform 
the  whole  face  of  things  as  they  exist  in  the  South 
to-day."  * 

It  can  be  readily  seen  from  these  two  accounts 

1  "My  Larger  Education,"  by  Booker  T,  Washington,  pp.  141-143. 


98  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

just  what  kind  of  education  Washington  believed 
in  and  tried  to  give  his  students  at  Tuskegee. 
It  was  quite  different  from  most  of  the  training 
that  had  been  given  the  negro  after  the  war.  In 
those  early  days  of  freedom,  many  of  the  negroes 
seemed  to  have  the  idea  that  the  bigger  the  book 
and  the  harder  the  words  in  it,  the  better  the 
education  was  that  they  secured.  Some  of  them 
thought,  too,  that  they  were  not  educated  unless 
they  studied  Latin  and  Greek  and  higher  mathe- 
matics, and  other  similar  subjects.  Booker  Wash- 
ington did  not  mean  that  history,  literature,  and 
foreign  languages  should  not  be  studied  and  had 
no  value.  What  he  was  emphasizing  was  the  fact 
that  boys  and  girls  should  first  get  a  clear  idea  of 
things  about  them.  Then  they  would  be  able 
better  to  understand  and  appreciate  such  subjects 
as  history  and  literature. 

One  other  feature  of  the  kind  of  education  that 
Tuskegee  stands  for  ought  to  be  mentioned,  and 
that  is  the  extension  work.  This  work  has  become 
a  very  large  part  of  the  Institute.  The  extension 
work  is  not  so  much  a  matter  of  teaching,  of 
education  in  the  usual  sense,  as  it  is  an  effort  to 
give  direct  and  practical  help  to  people  outside 
the  college  walls.  Most  of  this  extension  work 
has  been  done  in  Macon  and  adjoining  counties. 
From  the  first  month  of  his  school,  Washington 
began  to  go  into  the  country  round  about  and 
mingle  with  his  people.     He  went  to  their  homes, 


ioo  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

their  churches,  their  schools.  He  saw  their  poor 
farms,  their  lean  stock,  their  dilapidated  houses, 
their  lack  of  the  comforts  and  necessities  of  good 
living.  The  homes,  the  churches,  the  schoolhouses 
were  in  bad  condition.  Washington  had  the 
greatest  sympathy  for  these  people,  knowing 
why  they  were  in  poverty  and  ignorance,  and 
he  had  a  great  desire  to  help  them.  And  it  is 
through  this  extension  work  that  these  people  are 
helped. 

The  Institute  sends  its  workers  throughout  the 
surrounding  country  to  show  the  farmers  im- 
proved farm  machinery,  better  methods  of  farm- 
ing, better  breeds  of  live  stock  of  all  kinds,  better 
methods  of  dairying,  and  better  ways  of  preparing 
food,  keeping  house,  and  caring  for  the  children. 
They  insist  on  improving  the  school  buildings, 
the  churches,  and  the  homes.  As  a  result  of  this 
work,  there  are  now  in  Macon  County  a  number 
of  neat  new  schoolhouses,  with  a  teacher's  house 
alongside  each  school,  several  acres  of  land  ad- 
joining, and  a  good  church  close  by.  Thus  clean, 
pleasant,  and  thoroughly  happy  communities  are 
created.  In  such  communities  there  is  the  smallest 
amount  of  crime,  and  there  is  the  largest  amount 
of  prosperity  and  contentment  and  enjoyment. 

All  the  graduates  of  Tuskegee  are  enthusiasts 
for  education  and  community  builders.  Wherever 
they  go,  they  stand  for  the  best  in  life.  They 
are  devoted  to  Tuskegee  and  its  spirit  and    its 


EDUCATIONAL   LEADER 


IOI 


ideals.  It  is  this  devotion  which  makes  them  in- 
dustrious and  capable  and  law-abiding  and  helpful 
in  every  possible  way  in  the  communities  in  which 
they  live.  Hundreds  of  small  schools  have  been 
established  all  over  the  South  by  these  graduates, 


Tailoring  Division,  Tuskegee  Institute 

patterned  on  Tuskegee.     It  is  impossible  to  over- 
estimate the  good  they  have  done. 

Tuskegee  has  grown  to  be  one  of  the  greatest 
schools  in  the  country,  and  the  greatest  of  all 
schools  for  the  negroes.  It  has  grown,  from  ioo 
acres  and  three  little  buildings  to  a  plant  of  2100 
acres  and  in  buildings.  Instead  of  one  teacher 
with  30  pupils  there  are  now  more  than  200  teachers 


102  BOOKER  T.  WASHINGTON 

and  1500  students.  The  institution  has  a  large 
endowment,  and  it  owns  20,000  acres  of  land  given 
it  by  the  United  States  Government.  It  keeps  a 
large  dairy  herd,  runs  a  large  farm,  a  poultry  farm, 
and  keeps  a  large  number  of  pigs,  horses  and  sheep. 
Every  phase  of  education  is  taught,  but  the  main 
work  is  industrial,  —  carpentry,  brick  masonry, 
basket  making,  metal  working,  draughting,  auto- 
mechanics,  blacksmithing,  telegraphy,  farming, 
dairying,  lumbering,  building,  cooking,  sewing, 
nursing,  housekeeping  —  all  these  and  a  large 
number  of  other  callings  are  taught.  It  is  through 
such  training  as  this  that  Washington  believed 
that  the  negroes,  in  largest  numbers,  would  first 
get  their  best  start  in  life. 

Life  is  strenuous  in  this  school.  Here  is  an  out- 
line of  the  daily  work:  "5  a.m.,  rising  bell;  5:50 
a.m.,  warning  breakfast  bell;  6:00  a.m.,  breakfast 
bell;  6:20  a.m.,  breakfast  over;  6:20-6:50  a.m., 
rooms  cleaned;  6:50  a.m.,  work  bell;  7:30  a.m., 
morning  study  hour;  8:20  a.m.,  morning  school 
bell;  8:25  a.m.,  inspection  of  young  men's  dress 
in  ranks;  8:40  a.m.,  devotional  exercises  in  chapel; 
8:55  a.m.,  'five  minutes  with  the  daily  news'; 
9:00  a.m.,  class  work  begins;  12:00  M.,  class 
work  ends;  12:15  p.m.,  dinner;  1:00  p.m.,  work 
bell;  1:30  p.m.,  class  work  begins;  3:30  p.m.,  class 
work  ends;  5:30  p.m.,  bell  to  'knock  off'  work; 
6:00  p.m.,  supper;  7:10,  p.m.,  evening  prayers;  7:30 
p.m.,    evening    study    hour:     8:45    p.m.,    evening 


EDUCATIONAL   LEADER  103 

study  hour  closes;    9:20    p.m.,  warning  bell;    9:30 
p.m.,  retiring  bell."  x 

Washington  has  done  more  for  the  education 
of  the  negro  than  any  other  one  man,  white  or 
black.  His  work  at  Tuskegee,  his  great  educa- 
tional campaigns,  and  his  speeches  and  writings 
have  combined  to  make  his  accomplishments  of 
supreme  value.  Not  only  has  he  done  this  for 
the  negro,  but  his  work  has  helped  the  cause  of 
education  for  the  white  people  very  greatly.  All 
education  in  the  South  was  backward.  Like  his 
great  teacher,  General  Armstrong,  Washington 
realized  that  in  their  progress  the  two  races 
were  bound  together  in  the  South,  and  that  they 
must  grow  or  step  backward  together.  It  is  im- 
possible for  the  negro  to  make  his  best  progress 
unless  the  white  man  does  so  at  the  same  time. 
And  of  course  this  works  both  ways.  Because  he 
believed  this,  Washington  was  anxious  for  school 
conditions  for  white  people  to  change  just  as  well 
as  the  school  conditions  for  negroes.  Besides, 
he  wanted  all  the  people  to  have  the  advantages 
of  education.  He  did  not  hate  anybody,  and  con- 
sequently did  not  want  anybody  to  be  deprived 
of  the  best  there  was  in  life.  He  did  not  want 
anybody,  white  or  black,  to  fail  to  have  his  best 
opportunity.  So  he  worked  for  the  advancement  of 
the  cause  of  the  white  schools  as  well  as  the  black, 
and  his  services  to  the  white  schools  were  great, 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  p.  314, 


104  BOOKER   T.    WASHINGTON 

The  future  of  negro  education  is  very  bright. 
Schools  and  colleges  are  being  built  every  year. 
Better  teachers  are  being  prepared.  Children  are 
going  to  school  in  larger  numbers  than  ever  before, 
and  their  work  is  more  satisfactory. 

Every  year  the  states  appropriate  more  and 
more  money  for  negro  education.  The  negro  is 
now  able  to  pay  a  large  part  of  the  cost  of  his  own 
education,  and  he  is  very  willingly  doing  so. 

The  negro  is  determined  to  get  an  education. 
When  he  gets  it,  he  will  be  a  better  citizen.  And 
the  better  the  citizens  of  a  country  are,  the  better 
life  is  in  every  way,  and  the  more  completely  are 
all  our  problems  solved. 


CHAPTER  XII 

LEADING   HIS    PEOPLE 

Immediately  following  Washington's  great 
speech  in  Atlanta  in  1895,  there  came  the  state- 
ment from  all  parts  of  the  country,  "Here  is  the 
new  leader  of  the  negro  race."  During  the  last 
years  of  slavery,  and  the  Civil  War,  and  on  for 
years  after  the  war,  Frederick  Douglass,  as  has 
been  said,  was  the  acknowledged  leader  of  the 
negro  in  the  United  States.  Douglass  had  died  in 
the  early  part  of  the  year  1895.  It  seemed  that 
this  man  Washington  had  been  raised  up  to  take 
his  place.  The  Atlanta  speech  continued  to  be  a 
topic  of  discussion  throughout  the  country,  and 
coupled  with  this  discussion  was  invariably  the 
statement  that  here  was  the  new  leader  of  the 
race. 

Washington  says  that  he  was  at  a  great  loss  to 
know  what  people  meant  when  they  referred  to 
him  as  the  leader  of  his  people.  Of  course,  this 
leadership  was  not  a  thing  that  he  had  sought. 
The  people  thrust  this  duty  upon  him,  and  of 
course  no  man  has  a  right  to  shun  or  dodge  re- 
sponsibility that  is  thus  bestowed.. 

He  was  not  in  doubt  long  as  to  what  it  meant 
to  be  a  leader.     One  of  the  first  things   that   hap- 

105 


io6  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

pened  was  the  large  number  of  invitations  that 
came  to  him  to  deliver  addresses.  These  requests 
came  from  all  parts  of  the  country  and  from  all 
sorts  of  organizations.  A  very  large  number  of 
these  invitations  he  was  compelled  to  refuse. 
However,  when  he  felt  he  could  serve  his  in- 
stitution and  his  people,  he  always  accepted. 
He  represented  the  Negro  at  the  unveiling  of  the 
monument  of  R.  G.  Shaw,  in  Boston;  and  at  the 
Peace  Convention  in  Chicago  in  1898,  at  which 
time  President  McKinley  spoke.  He  attended 
most  of  the  large  religious  gatherings  of  his  people 
throughout  the  country,  and  spoke  before  them. 
Almost  immediately  there  began  to  pour  in  on  him 
a  perfect  flood  of  letters  from  all  parts  of  the  coun- 
try, from  white  and  black,  high  and  low,  rich  and 
poor,  asking  a  thousand  different  questions.  Now 
it  would  be  a  letter  from  a  railroad  president 
asking  about  some  problem  of  dealing  with  his 
employees;  now  from  a  school  man  asking  about 
the  segregation  of  the  races  in  schools.  Again, 
from  a  legislator,  asking  advice  on  some  legislation ; 
but  principally  the  letters  came  from  his  own 
people,  asking  all  sorts  of  questions  about  a 
multitude  of  things.  One  man  wanted  Washing- 
ton to  use  his  influence  to  secure  the  adoption  of 
a  flag  for  the  negro  race;  another  wanted  his 
backing  for  a  patent  medicine  that  would  take  the 
curl  out  of  the  negro's  hair.  Another  wanted  to 
know  if  the  negro  race  was  dying  out;    another, 


LEADING   HIS   PEOPLE  107 

if  the  race  was  being  blended  with  the  white  race; 
another,  if  he  thought  the  negro  was  being  treated 
right  politically.  Perhaps  the  most  remarkable 
request,  however,  was  from  a  woman,  who  wanted 
him  to  find  her  husband  who  had  deserted  her 
some  years  before.  And  in  order  that  he  might 
be  easily  identified  she  describes  him :  ' '  This  is  the 
hith  of  him  5-6  light  eyes  dark  hair  unwave  shave 
and  a  Suprano  Voice  his  age  58  his  name  Steve."  l 

To  all  of  these  letters  he  replied  in  the  fullest 
and  frankest  and  kindest  way. 

Whenever  there  was  race  friction  in  the  South, 
he  was  invariably  called  upon  either  to  go  in 
person  or  to  send  a  message.  For  example,  when 
the  Atlanta  riots  occurred  in  1906,  Washington 
was  in  the  North.  He  took  the  first  train  South. 
He  went  among  his  own  people  in  Atlanta  first, 
and  then  he  went  to  the  white  people  —  to  the 
Governor,  the  Mayor,  the  leading  citizens,  minis- 
ters and  merchants.  Largely  through  his  wise 
counsel  and  efforts  order  was  restored,  and  plans 
were  made  for  the  future. 

As  a  spokesman  for  his  people  he  wrote  con- 
stantly for  the  press.  Such  papers  as  the  Mont- 
gomery Advertiser,  the  Atlanta  Constitution,  the 
New  Orleans  Picayune,  the  Louisville  Courier 
Journal,  the  Chicago  Inter-Ocean,  and  the  Boston 
and  New  York  papers  gladly  published  his  articles. 

1  "Booker  T.  Washington:  Builder  of  a  Civilization,"  by  Scott  and 
Stowe,  p.  45. 


108  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

He  also  contributed  frequent  articles  to  the 
weekly  journals,  such  as  The  Outlook,  and  to  the 
monthly  magazines,  such  as  The  Century  Magazine. 

He  carried  this  phase  of  his  leadership  even 
further  than  the  current  press,  in  that  he  made 
some  notable  contributions  to  the  historical  liter- 
ature of  his  race.  The  first  book  he  wrote  was 
"Up  from  Slavery."  This  is  one  of  the  greatest 
pieces  of  literature  published  in  America.  The 
Hon.  Walter  H.  Page,  late  Ambassador  to  Great 
Britain,  said:  "The  only  books  that  I  have  read 
a  second  time  or  ever  cared  to  read  in  the  whole 
list  (of  literature  relating  to  the  negro)  are  '  Uncle 
Remus,'  and  'Up  from  Slavery,'  for  these  are  the 
great  literature  of  the  subject."  l 

Believing  the  accomplishments  of  the  race 
should  be  better  known  to  his  own  people,  Wash- 
ington determined  to  write  a  history  of  the  Negro. 
"The  Story  of  the  Negro  —  the  Rise  of  the  Race 
from  Slavery"  was  the  title  of  the  book  he  wrote, 
setting  forth  the  wonderful  progress  of  his  people. 

Other  books  by  him  were,  "My  Larger  Educa- 
tion," "Learning  with  the  Hands,"  —  about  eleven 
titles  in  all.  These  books  are  of  high  literary  merit, 
and  in  no  other  way,  perhaps,  did  Washington  so 
definitely  place  himself  as  a  leader  of  his  people  as 
in  the  realm  of  authorship.  These  books,  in  ad- 
dition to  their  literary  value,  were  of  great  benefit 
to  the  white  race  as  well  as  to  his  own  race,  in 

1  "Up  from  Slaven-,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  Introduction,  p.  xx. 


LEADING  HIS   PEOPLE  109 

getting  before  all  the  people  a  proper  estimate  of 
the  real  accomplishments  of  the  negro. 

One  of  the  most  important  phases  of  his  leader- 
ship of  the  negro  was  in  the  organization  of  the 
National  Negro  Business  League.  It  was  one  of 
Washington's  strongest  beliefs  that  the  negro 
must  prove  himself  able  to  exist  and  prosper  in 
business  matters.  The  race  —  individually  and 
collectively  —  must  demonstrate  its  ability  to 
take  care  of  itself  in  all  phases  of  industrial  life. 
Another  of  his  important  principles  was  that  the 
negro  should  emphasize  his  opportunities  rather 
than  his  drawbacks.  As  he  went  about  the  coun- 
try, he  noted  the  wonderful  progress  made  by  the 
negro  in  all  lines  of  business.  He  felt  that  it  would 
be  a  great  inspiration  to  those  who  had  achieved 
success  or  leadership  to  know  each  other,  and  a 
still  greater  encouragement  to  all  the  people  if 
they  knew  the  real  progress  being  made.  Acting 
upon  these  ideas,  he  called  a  meeting  of  repre- 
sentatives of  a  large  number  of  businesses  to  be 
held  in  Boston,  in  August,  1900.  Here  was  organ- 
ized the  National  Negro  Business  League.  Wash- 
ington was  made  president  and  continued  to  hold 
this  office  until  his  death  in  191 5. 

The  organization  brought  together  from  year  to 
year  all  the  representative  negro  business  men  of 
the  country.  They  made  reports  of  their  progress 
and  planned  for  future  advancement.  The  league 
has  been  a  wonderful  factor  in  the  development  of 


no  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

the  business  life  of  the  negro.  Several  other 
organizations,  such  as  the  Negro  Press  Association, 
the  Negro  Bar  Association,  the  Negro  Funeral 
Directors'  Association,  and  others  have  grown 
out  of  this  league.  It  was  through  this  league,  as 
perhaps  through  no  other  agency,  that  the  negro 
learned  of  his  own  great  wealth,  of  his  success  in 
banking,  in  manufacturing,  in  merchandise,  in 
the  undertaking  business,  and  in  a  large  number 
of  other  industries.  It  gave  him  a  wonderful  pride 
in  the  accomplishments  of  his  race.  He  knew 
that  the  negro  was  proving  to  the  world  that  he 
possessed  all  the  elements  necessary  for  handling 
any  phase  of  his  economic  life.  He  could  take  care 
of  himself  in  the  business  world. 

Washington  did  a  great  deal  for  the  negro  farmer. 
It  has  already  been  pointed  out  how  he  served  the 
people  of  his  county,  and  how  the  extension  work 
of  the  Institute  was  used  to  help  the  farmer.  In 
addition  to  this  he  organized  the  Tuskegee  Negro 
Conference.  In  the  beginning,  this  was  a  sort  of 
agricultural  experience  meeting  on  a  large  scale. 
The  good  farmers  from  all  the  surrounding  country 
were  brought  in,  and  each  was  asked  to  relate  his 
successful  experience.  Every  phase  of  farm  life 
was  covered.  Every  person  present  was  profited 
by  the  experience  and  the  success  of  his  neighbor. 
This  conference  has  greatly  broadened  in  scope 
and  has  grown  to  be  of  large  proportions  and  great 
influence. 


LEADING  HIS  PEOPLE  in 

Washington  was  truly  the  Moses  of  his  people, 
as  Andrew  Carnegie  had  said.  He  led  them  with 
great  wisdom  in  their  thought  and  their  conduct. 
He  was  their  spokesman,  their  interpreter.  He 
guided  them  to  higher  and  better  things.  He  made 
the  white  man  and  the  negro  know  each  other 
better  and  understand  each  other  better.  He 
lessened  the  friction  between  the  races  and  in- 
creased the  good  will.  He  brought  encouragement 
and  inspiration  to  his  own  race  and  gained  the 
sympathy  and  cooperation  of  the  white  race. 
Everywhere  he  opposed  ignorance  and  prejudice 
and  injustice  in  any  form.  Because  of  his  wisdom 
and  tact  as  a  leader,  not  only  the  negro  but  the 
entire  nation  was  helped. 


CHAPTER   XIII 

POLITICAL    EXPERIENCES 

Most  of  the  negroes  who  gained  any  promi- 
nence or  influence  in  the  years  just  after  the  Civil 
War  entered  politics.  Bruce  and  Revels  had  been 
United  States  Senators;  Elliott  and  Smalls  and  a 
dozen  others  had  been  Congressmen;  Pinchback, 
Lynch,  Langston,  Gibbs,  and  Greener  had  been 
sent  for  diplomatic  service  to  foreign  countries, 
and  others  had  held  high  State  offices;  and  a 
multitude  of  negroes  had  been  county  and  city 
officials  of  various  kinds. 

Everybody  expected  Washington  to  accept  some 
kind  of  political  position,  but  he  steadfastly  re- 
fused. Time  after  time,  men  of  his  own  race  and 
white  men  urged  him  to  run  for  office,  or  accept 
an  appointment  by  the  President  to  high  office. 
This  he  absolutely  refused  to  do.  He  said  that  his 
service,  whatever  it  was  worth,  would  be  given, 
not  in  politics  but  in  education.  He  believed  that 
entirely  too  much  emphasis  had  been  placed  on 
holding  office  by  the  negro,  just  after  the  war. 
He  was  more  concerned  about  whether  or  not  his 
people  could  have  the  opportunity  to  earn  an 
honest  living  than  he  was  about  getting  some 
political  job. 


POLITICAL   EXPERIENCES  113 

He  was  often  misunderstood  about  his  ideas  on 
holding  office  and  the  whole  question  of  the  part 
the  negro  should  take  in  politics;  for  he  was  con- 
vinced that  there  were  other  things  far  more  im- 
portant at  that  time  to  the  negro  than  the  matter 
of  voting. 

There  was  one  phase  of  politics,  however,  that 
Washington  did  keep  in  close  touch  with.  This 
can  be  best  explained  by  giving  some  of  his  cor- 
respondence. 

"Theodore  Roosevelt,  immediately  after  taking 
the  oath  of  office  as  President  of  the  United  States, 
in  Buffalo,  after  the  death  of  President  McKinley, 
wrote  Mr.  Washington  the  following  note: 

Buffalo,  N.  Y. 
September  14,  1901. 
Dear  Mr.  Washington  : 

I  write  you  at  once  to  say  that  to  my  deep  regret 
my  visit  South  must  now  be  given  up. 

When  are  you  coming  North?  I  must  see  you 
as  soon  as  possible.  I  want  to  talk  over  the  ques- 
tion of  possible  appointments  in  the  South  exactly 
on  the  lines  of  our  last  conversation  together. 

I  hope  my  visit  to  Tuskegee  is  merely  deferred 
for  a  short  season. 

Faithfully  yours, 
(Signed)  Theodore  Roosevelt. 

Booker  T.  Washington,  Esq. 
Tuskegee,  Ala. 

"  In  response  10  the  above  note  Mr.  Washington 
went  to  the  White  House  and  discussed  with  the 


ii4  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

President  'possible  future  appointments  in  the 
South.'"1 

Immediately  following  this  conference  with  the 
President,  there  was  a  vacant  judgeship  in  Ala- 
bama which  gave  the  President  an  opportunity 
to  carry  out  his  ideas  about  Southern  appoint- 
ments. He  called  upon  Washington  for  advice, 
and  Washington,  being  unable  to  go  himself  at  the 
time,  sent  his  secretary,  Emmett  J.  Scott,  to 
Washington  as  his  representative.  Largely  upon 
the  recommendation  of  Washington,  Judge  George 
Jones,  a  Democrat,  was  appointed  to  this  position. 
This  was  an  event  of  great  significance  indeed, 
when  a  Republican  President  of  the  United  States 
appointed  a  Southern  Democrat  to  office.  It  was 
done  in  accordance  with  the  ideas  of  both  the 
President  and  Washington,  —  that  only  men  of  the 
highest  fitness,  regardless  of  color  or  party,  should 
receive  appointment. 

From  this  time  on,  Washington  was  one  of  the 
President's  chief  advisers  in  Southern  appoint- 
ments. 

President  Roosevelt,  of  course,  appointed  many 
negroes  also.  He  believed  that,  when  negroes 
possessed  the  proper  qualifications  for  offices,  they 
should  have  a  share  in  them.  Washington  did 
not  try  to  get  very  many  negroes  appointed,  but 
he  did  try  to  get  the  very  best  negro  when  one  was 

1  "Booker  T.  Washington:  Builder  of  a  Civilization,"  by  Scott  and 
Stowe,  p.  49. 


POLITICAL  EXPERIENCES  115 

appointed.  In  other  words,  he  was  trying  to  im- 
prove the  quality  rather  than  increase  the  quantity 
of  negro  officeholders.  After  one  of  Washington's 
speeches,  in  which  he  laid  special  emphasis  on  this 
idea,  President  Roosevelt  sent  him  the  following 
letter: 

My  dear  Washington  : 

That  is  excellent;    and  you  have  put  epigram- 
matically  just  what  I  am  doing  —  that  is,  though 
I  have  rather  reduced  the  quantity,  I  have  done  my 
best  to  raise  the  quality  of  Negro  appointments. 
With  high  regards, 

Sincerely  yours, 
Theodore  Roosevelt.1 

Throughout  the  administrations  of  President 
Roosevelt  and  President  Taft,  Washington  was 
constantly  called  into  conference  and  rendered  a 
lasting  service  to  his  own  race  and  to  the  people 
of  the  country  in  giving  wise  counsel,  not  only 
about  politics  but  about  a  great  many  things  per- 
taining to  the  welfare  of  his  people. 

Washington  was  often  criticized  very  severely 
by  members  of  his  own  race  for  his  position  with 
reference  to  voting.  His  ideas  on  this  question 
are  well  stated  in  the  following  quotation: 

"I  am  often  asked  to  express  myself  more 
freely  than  I  do  upon  the  political  condition  and 
the   political   future   of  my   race.  .  .  .    My  own 

1  "Booker  T.  Washington:  Builder  of  a  Civilization,"  by  Scott  and 
Stowe,  p.  56. 


n6  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

belief  is,  although  I  have  never  before  said  so  in 
so  many  words,  that  the  time  will  come  when  the 
negro  in  the  South  will  be  accorded  all  the  political 
rights  which  his  ability,  character,  and  material 
possessions  entitle  him  to.  I  think,  though,  that 
the  opportunity  to  freely  exercise  such  political 
rights  will  not  come  in  any  large  degree  through 
outside  or  artificial  forcing,  but  will  be  accorded 
to  the  negro  by  the  Southern  white  people  them- 
selves, and  that  they  will  protect  him  in  the 
exercise  of  these  rights.  Just  as  soon  as  the  South 
gets  over  the  feeling  that  it  is  being  forced  by 
'foreigners'  or  'aliens'  to  do  something  which  it 
does  not  want  to  do,  I  believe  that  the  change  in 
the  direction  that  I  have  indicated  is  going  to 
begin."  l 

Again  he  says:  "I  contend  that,  in  relation  to 
his  vote,  the  negro  should  more  and  more  consider 
the  interests  of  the  community  in  which  he  lives, 
rather  than  seek  alone  to  please  some  one  who 
lives  a  thousand  miles  from  him  and  his  interests."2 

While  he  believed,  theoretically,  in  universal, 
free  suffrage,  he  very  frankly  admitted  that  the 
peculiar  conditions  existing  in  the  South  made  it 
necessary  to  put  restrictions  upon  the  ballot.  He 
was  opposed,  however,  to  any  discriminations  in 
the  law;  and  he  urged  with  all  his  power  that  the 
negro   be    given   good    educa  ional    and    business 

1  "Up  from  Slavery,"  by  Booker  T.  Washington,  p.  234. 

2  Ibid.,  p.  202. 


POLITICAL  EXPERIENCES  117 

advantages,  so  that  he  might  fit  himself  for  the 
full  responsibilities  and  duties  of  life. 

Washington  himself  never  had  any  trouble 
about  voting.  He  always  registered  and  always 
voted,  and  no  one  ever  raised  an  objection  to  his 
doing  so. 


CHAPTER   XIV 

VISITS    TO   EUROPE 

Washington  was  a  great  traveler.  He  was 
away  from  his  home  at  least  half  of  each  year  and 
often  more  than  that.  He  traveled  principally  in 
the  North,  making  speeches  and  interviewing 
people  who  might  help  Tuskegee.  While  on  these 
trips,  he  did  most  of  his  reading  and  writing.  He 
was  very  fond  of  newspapers  and  magazines. 
When  he  started  on  a  long  journey,  he  surrounded 
himself  with  a  large  number  of  papers  and  maga- 
zines and  books,  which  he  thoroughly  enjoyed. 
History  was  his  favorite  field  of  reading  outside 
of  newspapers  and  magazines.  He  was  especially 
fond  of  biography  —  of  reading  about  real  men, 
men  of  action  and  thought  and  great  talents. 
Much  of  his  greatest  inspiration  as  a  boy  came 
from  reading  the  lives  of  great  men.  Lincoln  was 
his  greatest  hero.  He  said  that  he  had  read  practi- 
cally every  recorded  word  of  Lincoln's. 

Washington  also  did  much  of  his  writing  on 
these  trips.  He  kept  his  stenographer  with  him 
all  the  time,  and,  when  he  was  not  reading,  he  was 
usually  dictating  a  speech,  or  a  letter,  or  an  article 
for  a  magazine.  A  large  part  of  his  greatest  book, 
"Up  from  Slavery,"  was  written  while  he  was  on 

118 


VISITS  TO   EUROPE 


119 


the  train  or  waiting  at  stations  between  trains.  It 
is  remarkable  that  he  should  have  been  able  to 
accomplish  so  much  under  such  circumstances,  for 
traveling  was  hard  work.  He  often  had  to  get  up 
in  the  middle  of  the  night  to  catch  a  train  and  then 
ride  all  day,  often 
without  Pullman  ac- 
commodations. He 
said  that  he  had 
slept  in  three  dif- 
ferent beds  in  one 
night,  so  broken 
was  his  rest  and  so 
often  did  he  have 
to  change  trains 
in  order  to  keep 
engagements.  Un- 
doubtedly it  was 
this  hard  traveling 
that  helped  to  break 
down  his  great 
strength  and  wear 
him    out. 

In  1899  he  made  a  speech  in  Boston,  and  some 
of  his  friends  noticed  that  he  seemed  extremely 
tired.  He  remained  in  Boston  several  days. 
One  day  during  his  stay  a  friend  asked  him  if  he 
had  ever  been  to  Europe.  He  replied  that  he  had 
not.  He  was  asked  very  casually  whether  he 
thought  that  he  would  enjoy  a  trip  to  Europe. 


Booker  T.  Washington,  First  Prin- 
cipal  OF   TUSKEGEE   INSTITUTE 


120  BOOKER   T.   WASHINGTON 

He  said  that  he  certainly  would,  but  he  did  not 
ever  expect  to  have  such  a  pleasure.  A  day  or 
two  later  some  of  his  friends  came  to  him  and  told 
him  they  had  a  little  surprise  for  him,  that  they 
had  made  arrangements  for  him  and  his  wife  to 
go  to  Europe  in  the  summer  and  spend  several 
months  on  a  vacation. 

Washington  was  very  greatly  surprised.  He 
thanked  his  friends  very  cordially  for  their  in- 
terest but  told  them  that  he  could  not  afford  to 
take  the  trip.  Whereupon  they  told  him  that  all 
the  money  for  the  expenses  of  the  trip  had  already 
been  raised,  and  that  it  would  not  cost  him  a  cent. 
He  thanked  them  again  very  sincerely  but  told 
them  he  could  not  think  of  leaving  his  work  that 
long,  —  that  money  had  to  be  raised  for  Tuske- 
gee,  and  that  he  had  to  stay  right  on  the  job  to 
get  it.  Then  they  told  him  that  a  group  of  his 
friends  had  already  raised  enough  money  to  keep 
Tuskegee  going  until  he  got  back.  He  then  gave 
another  excuse.  He  was  afraid  people  would  say 
that  he  was  ' '  stuck  up  "  ;  that  since  he  had  made 
some  success  in  the  world  he  was  trying  to  show 
off  and  play  the  big  man.  His  friends  told  him  that 
sensible  people  would  not  think  such  a  thing, 
and  that  he  need  not  bother  about  the  people  who 
had  no  sense.  Washington  thought,  too,  that  he 
had  no  right  to  quit  work  so  long.  He  had  worked 
all  his  life.  There  was  a  world  of  work  yet  he  had 
to  do.    To  eo  off  on  a  vacation  of  several  months, 


VISITS   TO   EUROPE  121 

when  there  was  so  much  to  be  done,  and  when 
other  people  were  at  work,  seemed  wrong  to  him. 
But  he  realized  finally  that  a  reasonable  amount 
of  rest,  when  one  is  tired,  means  more  and  better 
work  in  the  long  run. 

So  it  came  about  that,  on  May  10,  1899,  Wash- 
ington and  his  wife  went  aboard  the  ship  Friesland 
in  New  York  harbor  and  sailed  for  Europe.  It 
was  a  wonderful  experience  for  Washington.  In 
the  first  place,  as  he  went  aboard  the  ship,  he  re- 
ceived a  message  from  two  of  his  friends  telling 
him  that  they  had  decided  to  give  him  the  money 
to  build  a  magnificent  new  building  at  Tuskegee. 
That  was  a  good  " send-off."  Washington  was 
a  bit  uneasy  about  how  people  would  treat  him 
aboard  ship.  He  knew  what  unfortunate  experi- 
ences some  members  of  his  race  had  had  in  times 
past.  But  the  captain  received  him  cordially, 
and  everybody  on  board  was  exceedingly  courteous 
to  him  and  to  his  wife  in  every  way. 

Washington  on  his  way  to  Europe!  It  seemed 
to  him  like  a  dream.  Again  and  again  he  had 
thought  of  Europe,  —  much  as  he  did  of  heaven,  - 
a  goodly  place,  but  far  away.  It  had  never  even 
occurred  to  him  that  he  would  ever  go  to  Europe. 
And  now  he  was  on  his  way !  He  was  like  a  school- 
boy; he  was  happy  over  the  prospect  of  a  wonder- 
ful trip. 

He  did  not  get  seasick  on  the  voyage,  as  most 
of  the  passengers  did.    The  weather  was  fine,  and 


122  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

he  had  a  glorious  voyage.  But  he  did  not  know 
how  tired  and  worn  out  he  was  until  he  relaxed. 
About  the  second  day  he  began  to  sleep,  and  he 
says  that  from  then  on  until  they  landed  he 
slept  at  least  fifteen  hours  every  day.  He  con- 
tinued the  habit  of  long  hours  devoted  to  sleep 
all  the  time  he  was  gone,  and  it  was  one  of 
the  means  by  which  he  restored  his  depleted 
strength. 

After  a  fine  voyage  of  ten  days,  they  landed  at 
Antwerp,  a  famous  old  city  of  Belgium.  Here  they 
spent  a  few  quiet  days,  finding  it  extremely  in- 
teresting to  observe  the  people  with  their  dress 
and  manners  and  customs,  different  from  any- 
thing they  had  ever  seen  before. 

Then  they  went  on  a  delightful  journey  through 
the  picturesque  country  of  Holland.  Washington, 
always  interested  in  farming  and  especially  dairy 
farming,  was  greatly  delighted  on  this  trip.  On 
every  hand  were  the  wonderful  farms  of  the 
Dutch.  He  had  never  seen  such  intensive  cultiva- 
tion of  land.  Every  foot  of  ground  was  used. 
Vegetables  were  grown  in  boxes,  one  row  above 
another,  on  the  back  porches  of  the  houses,  so 
precious  was  the  scarce  land.  Ten  or  twelve  acres 
was  a  good  big  farm.  Coming  from  a  country 
where  land  is  so  abundant  and  cheap  and  so  ex- 
travagantly wasted  and  so  carelessly  cultivated, 
these  beautiful  farms  were  a  delight  to  him.  And 
the  herds  of  fine  Holstein  cattle  pleased  him  im- 


VISITS  TO   EUROPE  123 

mensely.  He  loved  cows;  and  these  seemed  to  be 
the  finest  herds  he  had  ever  seen  in  his  life. 

Out  of  Holland  and  back  into  the  historic  and 
now  heroic  Belgium,  the  party  went,  going  to 
Waterloo,  the  famous  battlefield  of  Napoleon's 
defeat,  and  to  other  places  of  interest;  and  from 
here  to  Paris,  the  gayest  and  brightest  of  all  the 
cities  of  Europe,  the  capital  of  France. 

While  in  Paris,  Washington  met  a  number  of 
distinguished  Americans.  He  made  two  or  three 
important  speeches  and  was  given  a  reception  by 
the  American  ambassador  at  Paris.  He  met  ex- 
President  Harrison,  General  Horace  Porter,  our 
ambassador,  Justices  Fuller  and  Harlan,  of  the 
United  States  Supreme  Court,  and  other  dis- 
tinguished men,  all  of  whom  were  most  cordial 
and  friendly. 

The  American  whom  he  found  most  interesting 
in  Paris,  however,  was  a  negro  —  Henry  O.  Tan- 
ner. Tanner  is  an  artist,  a  painter.  He  is  the 
son  of  the  beloved  Bishop  Tanner  and  was  born  in 
America.  He  showed  marked  talent  for  painting 
in  his  youth.  When  he  grew  up,  he  determined 
to  go  to  the  greatest  city  in  the  world  for  art.  He 
went  to  Paris  and  became  so  successful  in  his 
work  that  he  has  continued  to  live  there.  He  has 
several  paintings  in  the  Louvre,  the  greatest  and 
most  exclusive  art  gallery  in  the  world.  A  picture 
cannot  be  put  in  the  Louvre  unless  it  is  recognized 
and  accepted  as  a  great  work  of  art.    Washington 


124  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

spent  much  time  with  Tanner  and  was  greatly 
pleased  to  see  what  marked  success  had  been  won 
by  this  American  negro.  He  took  it  as  proof  of 
his  contention  that,  when  a  negro  proves  himself 
really  worthy,  he  will  be  recognized  and  honored, 
for  Tanner  enjoyed  the  esteem  and  regard  of  all 
his  associates,  regardless  of  race.  And  they  es- 
teemed him  because  of  his  worth,  and  not  because 
of  his  color. 

From  Paris  the  Washingtons  went  to  London. 
Here  they  visited  many  places  of  historic  interest, 
—  the  British  Museum,  Westminster  Abbey,  St. 
Paul's,  and  the  House  of  Commons.  They  met 
many  interesting  people,  --  the  Duke  and  Duchess 
of  Sutherland,  Joseph  H.  Choate,  American  am- 
bassador to  England,  Henry  M.  Stanley,  the 
great  African  explorer,  with  whom  Washington 
conversed  at  length.  They  were  also  received  by 
Queen  Victoria,  at  Windsor  Castle. 

It  had  been  a  wonderful  trip.  Washington  had 
learned  many  lessons  from  the  Old  World.  He 
had  seen  and  talked  with  men  who  helped  him  in 
the  better  understanding  of  his  own  great  task. 
He  had  had  a  wonderfully  good  time.  He  was 
thoroughly  rested  —  a  new  man.  He  plunged 
into  his  work  again  upon  his  return  with  great 
vigor  and  enthusiasm. 

Washington  made  two  other  trips  to  Europe 
during  his  lifetime.  The  second  one  was  largely 
like  the  first  —  a  trip  for  recreation  and  pleasure 


VISITS   TO   EUROPE  125 

and  rest.  But  the  third  trip  was  undertaken  with 
a  serious  purpose.  He  wanted  to  see  how  the 
poor  people  of  Europe  lived,  and  how  their  living 
conditions  compared  with  those  of  the  working- 
man  in  the  United  States.  He  was  particularly 
anxious  to  see  how  conditions  there  compared 
with  those  affecting  the  negro  population  of  the 
South.  He  also  wanted  to  see  whether  or  not  he 
could  find  anything  in  Europe  that  would  justify 
the  system  of  education  he  had  established  at 
Tuskegee.  So  this  time  he  left  the  usual  highways 
of  travel  and  went  far  into  the  interior,  visiting 
the  peasant  in  his  hut,  in  the  remotest  regions  of 
the  country,  --  the  miner  toiling  underground,  the 
laborer  in  the  quarry,  and  the  poor  man  at  his 
work  whatever  it  was  and  wherever  he  could  be 
found.  He  visited  the  farms  in  the  remote  parts 
of  Poland,  Austria,  and  Italy.  He  went  to  the 
sulphur  mines  in  Campo  Franco.  At  Catania  he 
saw  the  grape  harvest  and  the  men  barelegged, 
treading  the  wine  press  as  they  did  in  Bible  times. 
In  a  very  remote  part  of  Poland,  away  up  in 
the  mountains,  he  stopped  at  a  little  thatched- 
roof  cottage.  Desiring  to  see  how  the  place  looked 
on  the  inside,  he  knocked  at  the  door.  In  response 
a  man  opened  the  door,  and  Washington  said 
something  to  him  in  English,  thinking,  of  course, 
that  the  man  would  not  understand,  but  that  he 
would  be  able  to  see  inside  the  hut.  To  his  utter 
astonishment,  the  man  answered  him  in  English. 


126  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

Upon  further  conversation,  he  found  that  this  man 
had  once  lived  in  Detroit,  Michigan. 

When  he  was  in  the  mines  at  Campo  Franco, 
Sicily,  he  by  chance  met  a  man  who  had  once 
worked  in  the  mines  near  Maiden,  West  Virginia, 
where  Washington  himself  had  worked  when  a 
boy.     The  world  is  not  such  a  big  place  after  all! 

As  a  result  of  his  observations  of  conditions  in 
Europe,  Washington  came  to  the  conclusion  that 
the  negro  in  the  South  is,  generally  speaking,  in 
far  better  condition  than  the  peasant  of  Europe. 
He  also  noted  that,  wherever  conditions  were 
fairly  good,  where  the  natives  owned  the  land  and 
had  developed  reasonably  good  farming  con- 
ditions, there  was  no  emigration  from  that  region 
to  America.  But  where  conditions  were  bad, 
where  farms  were  not  well  kept,  where  the  people 
were  not  permitted  or  encouraged  to  own  their 
own  homes,  from  such  sections  there  was  always 
much  emigration  to  America.  In  other  words, 
good  local  conditions,  land  ownership,  good  schools, 
and  so  on,  tended  to  make  the  people  happy,  con- 
tented, and  desirous  of  remaining  where  they 
were.  In  this  fact  he  saw  a  great  lesson  for  his 
own  people.  He  believed  that  the  South  is  the 
home  of  the  negro,  that  here  it  is  possible  for  him 
to  do  his  best.  He  was,  therefore,  tremendously 
anxious  for  the  negroes  to  learn  how  to  cultivate 
the  soil  to  the  best  possible  advantage,  to  buy 
land,  to  build  schools,  to  establish  churches,  and 


VISITS   TO   EUROPE  127 

in  every  way  to  become  real  citizens  of  the  country 
where  they  were. 

Washington  wrote  an  interesting  book  describ- 
ing all  that  he  saw  and  learned  on  this  trip.  It  is 
called,  "The  Man  Farthest  Down."  As  stated 
before,  he  pointed  out  that  there  were  many,  many 
people  "farther  down"  than  the  American  negro; 
that  compared  to  most  of  the  people  of  Europe, 
he  ought  to  be  exceedingly  thankful  that  his  con- 
dition is  as  good  as  it  is.  Of  course  he  did  not 
mean  by  this  that  conditions  with  the  negro  were 
what  they  ought  to  be;  but  that  the  negro  should 
be  thankful  for  the  progress  that  he  has  made; 
that  he  should  take  courage,  and  go  forward  to 
better  things. 

The  most  interesting  experience  of  this  trip  to 
Europe  was  his  visit  to  the  King  and  Queen  of 
Denmark,  at  Copenhagen.  On  his  first  visit  to 
the  palace  he  was  received  by  the  King.  Wash- 
ington was  much  impressed  by  the  King's  cordial- 
ity and  simplicity,  by  his  knowledge  of  America, 
and  by  his  acquaintance  even  with  the  work 
Washington  was  doing  at  Tuskegee.  At  the  close 
of  the  interview,  the  King  invited  him  to  dine  at 
the  palace  that  night. 

Now  the  invitation  of  a  king  is  the  same  as  a 
command,  and  one  is  always  expected  to  accept. 
Of  course  Washington  was  delighted  to  accept  this 
invitation. 

Washington  spent  the  rest  of  the  day  preceding 


128  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

the  dinner  hour  visiting  the  country  people  near 
Copenhagen.  He  was  late  getting  home,  and  he 
was  terrified  when  he  realized  that  he  might  be 
late  for  dinner.  To  keep  the  King  and  Queen  wait- 
ing would  be  a  terrible  offense.  He  dressed  as 
rapidly  as  he  could.  But  in  his  haste,  he  pulled  his 
necktie  to  pieces,  —  the  only  one  he  had  fit  for 
the  occasion!  He  pinned  it  together  the  best  he 
could  and  put  it  on;  but  he  says  that  he  was  in 
great  distress  throughout  the  dinner  lest  the  tie 
come  to  pieces  again. 

He  reached  the  palace  just  in  time  for  the 
dinner.  He  was  taken  directly  to  the  King,  who 
led  him  to  where  the  Queen  was  standing,  and 
presented  him  to  her.  She  was  very  cordial  and 
gracious.  She  spoke  English  perfectly;  and  Wash- 
ington was  again  surprised  to  find  that  she,  too, 
was  thoroughly  familiar  with  affairs  in  the  United 
States,  and  that  she  also  knew  about  Tuskegee. 

There  was  a  very  distinguished  group  of  people 
present.  The  dinner  was  given  in  the  magnificent 
Summer  Palace,  and  everything  was  truly  royal 
in  its  elegance  and  splendor.  Washington  says, 
"As  I  ate  food  for  the  first  time  in  my  life  out  of 
gold  dishes,  I  could  not  but  recall  the  time  when 
as  a  slave  boy  I  ate  my  syrup  from  a  tin  plate."  x 

1  "Booker  T.  Washington:  Builder  of  a  Civilization,"  by  Scott  and 
Stowe,  p.  157. 


CHAPTER  XV 

BOOKER   T.    WASHINGTON:    THE   MAN 

Booker  Washington  at  home,  with  his  wife 
and  children,  his  garden,  his  chickens,  his  pigs, 
his  horses  and  cows,  is  far  more  interesting  than 
Washington  the  orator,  the  writer,  the  teacher, 
the  traveler,  the  college  principal. 

No  man  ever  loved  his  home  more  than  Washing- 
ton. He  had  to  be  away  from  it  much  of  the  time. 
He  was  away  at  least  half  of  each  year.  This  was 
a  great  hardship  to  him,  and  just  as  often  as  was 
possible  he  got  away  from  his  exacting  duties  and 
returned  to  Tuskegee  to  find  rest  and  quiet  and 
comfort  and  joy  with  his  own  family. 

He  was  an  early  riser,  when  at  home,  getting 
up  always  at  6  o'clock.  His  first  morning  task 
was  to  gather  the  fresh  eggs.  He  was  very  fond 
of  chickens  and  always  kept  a  number  of  them. 
"I  begin  my  day,"  he  says,  ''by  seeing  how  many 
eggs  I  can  find,  or  how  many  little  chicks  there 
are  that  are  just  beginning  to  creep  through  the 
shells.  ...  I  like  to  find  the  new  eggs  myself,  and 
I  am  selfish  enough  to  permit  no  one  else  to  do 
this.  .  .  ."i 

1  "Booker  T.  Washington:  Builder  of  a  Civilization,"  by  Scott  and 
Stowe,  p.  307. 

129 


130  BOOKER  T.  WASHINGTON 

He  was  very  fond  of  animals  of  all  kinds,  but 
the  pig  was  his  favorite.  He  always  kept  a  num- 
ber of  the  very  finest  breeds  of  Berkshires  and 
Poland  Chinas.  After  gathering  the  fresh  eggs,  his 
next  job  was  feeding  the  pigs.  After  that  came 
a  visit  to  the  cows.  He  always  kept  a  good  garden, 
too,  and  a  part  of  the  early  morning  was  given 
to  working  in  it.  He  had  a  very  peculiar  custom 
or  idea  about  his  garden  work.  He  always  worked 
barefooted.  He  said  that  there  was  something 
in  the  soil  that  gave  one  strength  and  health  and 
power,  —  but  you  had  to  get  it  by  direct  contact 
with  the  soil. 

After  this  early  morning  round  of  work  was 
done,  he  mounted  his  horse  for  an  hour's  ride. 
He  usually  rode  over  the  college  farm  and  thor- 
oughly inspected  it;  then  to  the  dairy,  and  all 
over  the  college  grounds,  to  see  that  everything 
was  going  as  it  should. 

After  breakfast,  he  went  to  his  office  and  gave 
his  attention  to  the  day's  mail,  which  averaged 
daily  about  125  incoming  and  800  outgoing  letters. 
Later  in  the  day  he  would  visit  classrooms,  in- 
spect the  building  that  was  going  on,  go  to  the 
great  dining  hall  at  dinner,  go  to  the  shops,  talk 
to  the  students  and  to  the  members  of  the  faculty 
as  he  met  them.  Just  before  supper  he  would  call 
for  his  horse  again  and  go  off  for  an  hour's  ride  or 
for  a  hunt.  Sometimes  he  would  walk  rather  than 
ride.     While  on  these  walks,  he  would  often  run 


THE  MAN  131 

for  a  couple  of  miles  at  top  speed.  After  supper, 
there  was  usually  a  meeting  of  some  kind,  —  a 
committee  or  faculty  meeting,  or  conference  with 
a  delegation  of  visitors.  Chapel  exercises,  de- 
votional in  character,  came  at  8:30.  And  after 
that,  very  frequently,  there  was  an  inspection  of 
the  dormitories. 

He  had  three  children,  Portia,  Booker,  and 
Davidson.  One  of  his  greatest  pleasures  was  to 
take  the  children  for  a  long  walk  on  Sunday  after- 
noons. They  would  tramp  for  miles  through  the 
fields  and  woods,  gathering  flowers  or  nuts  or 
berries.  They  studied  the  trees,  the  flowers,  and 
the  birds.  They  waded  in  the  streams,  ran  foot- 
races, and  played  games. 

Every  night  after  supper  he  would  romp  and 
play  with  the  children.  He  would  roll  on  the  floor, 
let  the  children  ride  on  his  back,  play  all  sorts  of 
jolly  games,  or  he  would  tell  stories.  He  was  an 
excellent  story-teller,  and  it  was  always  a  treat 
to  hear  the  wonderful  tales  he  could  tell. 

Washington  was  married  three  times.  His  first 
wife,  as  stated  in  a  previous  chapter,  was  Fannie 
M.  Smith,  of  Maiden,  who  died  in  1884,  leav- 
ing a  daughter,  Portia.  The  second  marriage 
was  to  Olivia  Davidson,  who  had  been  a  teacher 
at  Tuskegee  from  its  beginning.  She  had  been  of 
wonderful  assistance  to  Washington  in  the  early 
days  of  Tuskegee.  She  was  the  mother  of  the 
two  boys,  Booker,  Jr.,  and  Davidson.     His  third 


132 


BOOKER  T.  WASHINGTON 


marriage  was  to  Margaret  Murray,  of  Mississippi, 
a  graduate  of  Fisk  University  and  for  several 
years  a  teacher  at  Tuskegee.  This  marriage  oc- 
curred in  1892.  Mrs.  Washington  has  had  a  very 
useful  and  distinguished  career.  No  woman  of 
her  race  has  helped  her  people  so  much  in  recent 


Booker  T.  Washington  and  His  Family 

years.  She  will  be  remembered  not  merely  as  the 
wife  of  Booker  Washington,  but  for  her  own  re- 
markable service  to  her  people. 

Washington  was  a  man  of  unusual  personal  ap- 
pearance. From  the  description  that  James  Creel- 
man  gave  of  him  on  the  occasion  of  his  famous 


THE  MAN  133 

speech  in  Atlanta,  it  can  readily  be  seen  that  he 
was  a  man  of  commanding  and  striking  person- 
ality.    Wherever  he  went  he  attracted  attention. 

He  was  an  untiring  worker.  He  went  at  tre- 
mendous speed  all  the  time.  He  could  do  as  much, 
as  a  rule,  as  three  or  four  ordinary  men.  He  kept 
a  stenographer  with  him  all  the  time.  As  he  went 
about  the  grounds  he  would  dictate  suggestions 
and  ideas  for  changes  and  improvements.  He 
would  often  awaken  his  stenographer  at  night  to 
dictate  a  letter  or  a  speech  or  a  statement  for  the 
papers.  In  this  way  he  never  overlooked  an 
important  thought  or  idea  that  occurred  to  him, 
and  his  ideas  were  always  taken  down  while  fresh 
and  vivid  in  his  mind.  He  often  confounded  his 
faculty  by  his  tremendous  energy.  He  would  call 
them  in  and  lay  out  enough  work  for  them  to  keep 
busy  for  a  week  and,  then,  almost  before  they 
could  get  started,  demand  results.  He  could 
work  so  fast  himself  and  do  so  much,  he  never 
realized  that  it  took  other  people  longer  to  finish 
a  task. 

He  had  a  very  active  mind.  He  could  think 
quickly.  He  was  also  a  good  judge  of  men  and 
knew  the  worth  of  a  man  almost  at  sight.  When 
any  subject  was  presented  to  him,  he  would  arrive 
at  conclusions  quickly  and  accurately. 

As  he  grew  older,  he  exhibited  a  certain  amount 
of  absentmindedness,  due,  perhaps,  to  concentra- 
tion of  mind.     He  would  meet  his  best  friends  on 


134  BOOKER  T.  WASHINGTON 

the  street  and  not  speak  to  them.  He  was  so  pre- 
occupied by  his  thinking  that  he  simply  did  not 
recognize  folks  when  he  met  them. 

Washington  was  a  proud  and  independent  man. 
Many  people  thought  he  was  conceited.  He  was 
far  too  great  a  man  for  that.  He  was  not  vain 
and  he  was  not  ashamed  of  himself  or  his  race. 
He  held  his  head  high.  He  could  not  be  cowed. 
He  had  great  self-confidence.  He  knew  his  abili- 
ties and  powers  and  thought  it  his  duty  to  appraise 
them  properly.  This  he  did  in  a  very  intelligent 
and  sensible  way.  But  he  was  not  boastful;  in 
fact,  he  was  very  humble.  Many  of  the  things 
which  he  said  and  did  that  were  often  taken  for 
personal  vanity  and  boastfulness  were  not  personal 
at  all  but  were  evidences  of  his  pride  in  his  race. 

Washington  had  great  sympathy  for  the  un- 
fortunate. He  was  constantly  bringing  up  in 
faculty  meeting  the  case  of  some  poor  negro  who 
was  in  distress,  —  who  couldn't  pay  the  rent,  was 
without  food  or  clothes,  or  was  in  hard  luck  in 
some  way.  He  insisted  that  these  people  be  helped 
regardless  of  how  they  came  to  be  in  their  un- 
fortunate condition.  Scarcely  a  day  passed  that 
he  did  not  give  aid  to  some  one  who  needed  it. 

There  was  an  old,  crack-brained  preacher  who 
would  come  to  the  Institute  and  speak  by  the  hour 
right  outside  the  office,  but  Washington  would 
not  let  him  be  disturbed  and  always  gave  him  a 
little  contribution. 


THE   MAN  135 

There  was  another  old  negro  who  had  great 
ability  in  getting  contributions  from  Washington. 
"One  day,  when  Washington  was  driving  down 
the  main  street  of  Tuskegee  behind  a  pair  of  fast 
and  spirited  horses,  this  old  man  rushed  out  into 
the  street  and  stopped  him  as  though  he  had  a 
matter  of  the  greatest  urgency  to  impart  to  him. 
When  Mr.  Washington  had  with  difficulty  reined 
his  horses  and  asked  him  what  he  wanted,  the  old 
man  said  breathlessly,  Tse  got  a  tirkey  for  yo' 
Thanksgivin' ! ' 

"'How  much  does  it  weigh?'  inquired  Mr. 
Washington. 

"'Twelve  to  fifteen  pounV 

"After  thanking  the  old  man  warmly,  Mr. 
Washington  started  to  drive  on,  when  the  old 
fellow  added,  'I  jest  wants  to  borrow  a  dollar  for 
to  fatten  yo'  tirkey  for  you ! ' 

"With  a  laugh,  Mr.  Washington  handed  the 
old  man  a  dollar,  and  drove  on.  He  never  could 
be  made  to  feel  that  by  these  spontaneous  gener- 
osities he  was  encouraging  thriftlessness  and  men- 
dicancy. He  was  incorrigible  in  his  unscientific 
open-handedness  with  the  poor,  begging  older 
members  of  his  race."1 

"Old  man  Harry  Varner  was  the  night  watch- 
man of  the  school  in  its  early  days,  and  a  man 
upon  whom  Mr.  Washington  very  much  depended. 

^'Booker  T.  Washington:  Builder  of  a  Civilization,"  by  Scott  and 
Stowe,  p.  144. 


136  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

He  lived  in  a  cabin  opposite  the  school  grounds. 
After  hearing  many  ta1ks  about  the  importance 
of  living  in  a  real  house  instead  of  a  one  or  two 
room  cabin,  old  Uncle  Harry  finally  decided  that 
he  must  have  a  real  house.  Accordingly  he  came 
to  his  employer,  told  him  his  feeling  in  the  matter, 
and  laid  before  him  his  meagre  savings,  which  he 
had  determined  to  spend  for  a  real  house.  Mr. 
Washington  went  with  him  to  select  the  lot  and 
added  enough  out  of  his  own  pocket  to  the  scant 
savings  to  enable  the  old  man  to  buy  a  cow  and  a 
pig  and  a  garden  plot  as  well  as  the  house.  From 
then  on,  for  weeks,  he  and  old  Uncle  Harry  would 
have  long  and  mysterious  conferences  over  the 
planning  of  that  little  four-room  cottage.  It  is 
doubtful  if  Mr.  Washington  ever  devoted  more 
time  or  thought  to  p1anning  any  of  the  great 
buildings  of  the  Institute.  No  potentate  was  ever 
half  as  proud  of  his  palace  as  Uncle  Harry  of  his 
four-room  cottage,  when  it  was  finally  finished  and 
painted  and  stood  forth  in  all  its  glory  to  be  ad- 
mired of  all  men.  And  Booker  Washington  was 
scarcely  less  proud  than  Uncle  Harry. 

"With  Uncle  Harry  Varner,  'Old  man'  Brannum, 
the  original  cook  of  the  school,  and  Lewis  Adams,  of 
the  town  of  Tuskegee,  whom  Mr.  Washington  men- 
tions in  'Up  from  Slavery,'  as  one  of  his  chief  ad- 
visers, all  unlettered-before-the-war  negroes,  his  re- 
lationship was  always  particularly  intimate.  These 
three  old  men  enjoyed  the  confidence  of  the  white 


THE   MAN  137 

people  of  the  town  of  Tuskegee  to  an  unusual 
extent  and  often  acted  as  ambassadors  of  good 
will  between  the  head  of  the  school  and  his  white 
neighbors,  when  from  time  to  time  the  latter 
showed  a  disposition  to  look  askance  at  the  rapidly 
growing  institution  on  the  hill  beyond  the  town, 

"Another  intimate  friend  of  Mr.  Washington's 
was  Charles  L.  Diggs,  known  affectionately  on  the 
school  grounds  as  'Old  man'  Diggs.  The  old  man 
had  been  body  servant  to  a  Union  officer  in  the 
Civil  War,  and  after  the  war  had  been  carried  to 
Boston,  where  he  became  the  butler  in  a  fashion- 
able Back  Bay  family  When  Mr.  Washington 
first  visited  Boston,  as  an  humble  and  obscure 
young  negro  school-teacher,  pleading  for  his  strug- 
gling school,  he  met  Diggs,  and  Diggs  succeeded  in 
interesting  his  employers  in  the  sincere  and  earnest 
young  teacher.  When,  years  afterward,  the  In- 
stitute had  grown  to  the  dignity  of  needing  stew- 
ards, Mr.  Washington  employed  his  old  friend  as 
steward  of  the  Teachers'  Home.  In  all  the  years 
thereafter  hardly  a  day  passed  when  Mr.  Washing- 
ton was  at  the  school  without  having  some  kind 
of  powwow  with  'O'd  man'  Diggs  regarding  some 
matter  affecting  the  interests  of  the  school. 

"To  the  despair  of  his  family  Booker  Washing- 
ton seemed  to  go  out  of  his  way  to  find  forlorn  old 
people  whom  he  could  befriend.  He  sent  pro- 
visions weekly  to  an  humble  old  black  couple  from 
whom  he  had  bought  a  tract  of  land  for  the  school. 


138  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

He  did  the  same  for  old  Aunt  Harriet  and  her  deaf, 
dumb,  and  lame  son,  except  that  to  them  he  pro- 
vided fuel  as  well.  On  any  particularly  cold  day, 
he  would  send  one  or  more  students  over  to  Aunt 
Harriet's  to  find  out  if  she  and  her  poor  helpless 
son  were  comfortable.  Also  every  Sunday  after- 
noon, to  the  joy  of  this  pathetic  couple,  a  partic- 
ularly appetizing  Sunday  dinner  unfailingly  made 
its  appearance.  And  these  were  only  a  few  of  the 
pensioners  and  semipensioners  whom  Booker 
Washington  accumulated  as  he  went  about  his 
kindly  way."  1 

Washington  had  the  capacity  of  making  friends. 
He  had  the  gift  of  friendship.  His  white  friends 
were  as  numerous  and  staunch  as  were  those  of  his 
own  race.  His  close  friendship  with  such  men 
as  William  H.  Baldwin,  Jr.,  H.  H.  Rogers,  and 
others  has  already  been  mentioned.  It  woulcf  be 
unfair  to  him  and  to  them  to  leave  the  impression 
that  their  relations  were  merely  those  of  bene- 
factor and  beggar.  They  were  friends  as  man  to 
man.  Washington  and  Roosevelt  were  friends  in 
the  same  way. 

It  would  be  unfairer  still  to  leave  the  impression 
that  Washington's  friends  were  rich  men  only  and 
men  in  the  North  only.  This  was  not  the  case. 
Perhaps  his  strongest  friends  were  in  the  South, 
many   of  whom  were  not  in  the  public  eye.     He 

1  "Booker  T.  Washington:  Builder  of  a  Civilization,"  by  Scott  and 
Stowe,  pp.  145-147. 


THE   MAN 


139 


himself  records  the  fact  that  few  men  in  his  entire 
career  were  of  such  genuine  help  to  him  as  Captain 
Howard,  conductor  on  the  W.  &  A.  Railroad.  He 
did  not  have  an  enemy  in  his  own  town  of 
Tuskegee.  All  through  the  South  were  men 
whom  Washington 
counted  among  his 
warmest  personal 
friends. 

Among  his  own 
people,  he  was  no 
less  fortunate  in 
his  friendships.  He 
knew  and  loved 
Moton  and  Scott 
and  Banks  and  Car- 
ver and  Fortune 
and  Scarborough, 
and  a  great  host  of 
others.  All  these 
were  his  most  loyal 
and  devoted 
friends.  But  none 
of  these  were  really 
any  closer  to  him  than  "Old  man"  Diggs  or  Rufus 
Herron  or  many  a  lowly  man  of  Macon  County. 
There  was  such  sincerity,  such  a  genuineness  about 
this  man  that  all  true  men  were  drawn  to  him. 

Washington  had  a  keen  sense  of  humor.    This  is 
the  reason  he  was  always  so  even-tempered.     He 


Robert  Russa  Moton,  Successor  to 
Booker  T.  Washington  at  Tuskegee 


140  BOOKER   T.  WASHINGTON 

kept  perfect  control  of  himself  at  all  times,  and 
it  was  largely  his  sense  of  humor  that  enabled  him 
to  do  so.  He  saw  the  ridiculous  side  of  things. 
He  could  tell  perfectly  side-splitting  stories,  par- 
ticularly about  his  own  people.  These  stories  were 
always  clean  and  without  a  sting,  and  always  had 
some  point  to  them.  He  was  thoroughly  good- 
natured,  and  every  one  in  his  presence  felt  re- 
freshed and  happy  by  reason  of  having  come  in 
contact  with  him. 

He  had  a  strong  sense  of  justice.  He  believed 
the  problems  of  the  white  race  as  well  as  those  of 
the  black  race  must  be  settled  on  a  basis  of  justice, 
if  they  were  ever  to  be  settled  right.  The  fact 
that  he  constantly  spoke  of  justice  and  fair  dealing 
toward  the  white  race  showed  that  there  was  no 
color  boundary  to  this  great  attribute  of  his 
character.  He  was  not  quarrelsome;  he  did  not 
hate ;  he  did  not  lose  his  temper  when  he  saw  in- 
justice be:ng  done  to  his  people  However,  he 
never  did  condone  such  injustice;  he  was  ever 
ready  to  denounce  it.  He  labored  unceasingly  to 
bring  about  a  mutual  understanding  between  the 
two  races  and  to  inspire  in  his  own  race  those 
principles  which  he  saw  with  such  clear  vision. 
He  said  that  the  negro  ought  to  put  more  time  on 
improving  his  opportunities  than  crying  over  his 
disadvantages.  He  believed  that  the  first  and  most 
important  thing  was  for  the  negro  to  become  well 
prepared  for  the  ballot,  and  by  and  by  he  would 


THE   MAN 


141 


get  it.  He  argued  that  the  negroes  should  work 
and  save  and  study  and  conduct  themselves  in  the 
proper  way,  and  that  in  course  of  time  recognition 
would  come  to  them.  Sooner  or  later,  the  right, 
the  just  thing,  would  prevail,  and  the  important 
thing;  for  the  negro  was  to  know  he  was  right. 


Booker  T.  Washington  and  His  Grandchildren 

Washington  had  the  courage  to  denounce  those 
members  of  his  own  race,  particularly  some  of 
the  ministers,  who  did  not  live  as  they  should. 
This  was  a  bold  thing  to  do  and  brought  much 
criticism  upon  him,  but,  in  the  long  run,  it  was  a 
great  service  to  his  race  and  to  the  whole  country. 

In  spite  of  the  fact  that  Washington  was  a  man 
of  unusual  health  and  strength,  his  hard  work 
and   the   great   responsibilities  he   carried   began 


142  BOOKER   T.    WASHINGTON 

finally  to  tell  on  him.  But  he  kept  on.  He  had 
wonderful  will  power,  and  he  would  drive  himself 
to  his  work  from  day  to  day,  when  other  men 
would  have  taken  to  their  beds.  He  could  not 
admit  to  himself  that  he  was  losing  strength. 
Right  up  to  the  last,  he  did  an  enormous  amount 
of  work. 

In  the  early  fall  of  191 5,  he  went  North  to  de- 
liver an  address  before  the  National  Council  of 
Congregational  Churches,  held  in  New  Haven, 
Connecticut.  Although  he  had  not  been  entirely 
well  for  some  time,  no  one  had  any  idea  that  he  was 
seriously  ill.  Shortly  after  the  address  in  New 
Haven,  he  collapsed.  His  friends  in  New  York 
City  had  him  removed  to  St.  Luke's  Hospital 
there. 

The  physicians  made  a  careful  examination  and 
frankly  told  him  that  he  was  critically  ill  and  could 
live  but  a  few  hours.  When  he  learned  that  he 
must  die,  he  insisted  on  starting  for  home  at  once. 
The  doctors  told  him  that  he  could  not  go;  that 
it  would  mean  certain  death;  that  he  could  not 
live  through  the  journey.  His  reply  was:  "I  was 
born  in  the  South,  I  have  lived  and  labored  in  the 
South,  and  I  expect  to  die  and  be  buried  in  the 
South." 

Arrangements  were  hurriedly  made  for  the 
journey  to  Tuskegee.  No  one  believed  that  he 
would  reach  there  alive.  One  of  the  doctors  had 
said  that  it  was  "uncanny  to  see  a  man  up  and 


THE   MAN 


143 


about  who  ought,  by  all  the  laws  of  nature,  to  be 
dead."  When  they  reached  the  railway  station 
in  New  York  a  rolling  chair  had  been  provided  for 
Washington,  but  he  refused  to  use  it  and  walked 
to  the  train  leaning  on  the  arms  of  his  friends. 

As  the  train  pulled  out  and  headed  for  his  be- 
loved Southland,  his  spirits  began  to  revive,  and 
he  seemed  much  stronger.  He  was  determined 
to  beat  death  in  this  race.  As  they  journeyed  on, 
he  would  ask  the  names  of  the  stations.  When 
he  was  told  that  they  were  passing  Greensboro, 
a  triumphant  look  came  into  his  eyes.  Charlotte, 
Greenville,  Atlanta  —  he  was  winning!  Finally 
they  came  to  Chehaw,  the  little  station  five  miles 
from  Tuskegee,  the  junction  point  of  the  railroad 
from  Tuskegee  to  the  mam  line. 

A  few  more  minutes,  and  he  saw  the  familiar 
and  much  loved  scenes  of  his  own  Tuskegee. 

He  had  won! 

But  his  victory  was  a  short  one.  For  when  the 
sun  came  up  on  the  next  morning,  the  fourteenth 
day  of  November,  191 5,  Booker  Washington  was 
dead. 


INDEX 


Alabama  Hall,  69-70. 

Alabama  Legislature,  45,  75. 

Armstrong,  Gen,  S.  C.,  accom- 
panies Washington  on  tour,  70; 
founder  of  Hampton,  23-24; 
invites  Washington  as  com- 
mencement speaker,  32,  77; 
sends  Washington  to  Tuskegee, 
45;  sketch  of,  22. 

Atlanta  Constitution,  81. 

Atlanta  Speech,  79-81. 

Baldwin,  William  H.  Jr.,  Presi- 
dent of  Board  of  Trustees, 
Tuskegee  Institute,  73,  138. 

Belgium,  Washington's  visit  to, 
122. 

Books,  written  by  Washington, 
108. 

Buildings,  first  at  Tuskegee,  50- 
51,58. 

Bulloch,  Gov.,  of  Ga.,  81. 

Business  League,  National  Negro, 
109. 

Cabbages,  an  oration  on,  96. 

Cabin,  description  of  a,  3. 

Capital,  campaign  for  removal, 
W.  Va.,  37. 

Carnegie,  Andrew,  71,  j^,  ill. 

Carney,  Sergeant  William  H.,  85. 

Chicago  Peace  Convention,  106. 

"Chopping  bee,"  52. 

Coal  mine,  12-13. 

Coat,  sale  of,  28. 

Commencement  exercises  at  Tus- 
kegee, 93-95. 

Copenhagen,  Washington's  visit 
to,  127. 

Corner  stone,  first  building  at 
Tuskegee,  59-60. 

Cotton  States  Exposition,  78. 

Creelman,  James,  79. 


Davidson,  Olivia,  49,  66. 
Denmark,  Washington's  visit  to, 

127. 
Douglass,  Frederick,  76,  82,  105. 

Education  of  negro,  effect  of,  90- 
91;  future  of,  104;  negro  educa- 
tion after  Civil  War,  22;  Wash- 
ington's idea  of,  91-93,  98,  103. 

Eliot,  President  C.  W.,  67. 

"Emancipation  Proclamation,"  8. 

"Entitles,"  9. 

Europe,  Washington's  trips  to, 
119-128. 

Extension  work  of  Tuskegee,  100. 

Farm,  purchase  of,  50-51. 
"Festivals,"  54. 
Freedmen's  Bureau,  90. 

Gifts  to  Tuskegee,  54,  74~75- 

Hales'  Ford,  Washington's  birth- 
place, 3. 

Hampton  Institute,  15,  17,  20, 
22-23,  26-27,  29-30,  32,  34. 

Harvard  University,  82. 

Holland,  Washington's  visit  to, 
122. 

Howard,  Captain,  conductor  on 
the  W.  and  A.  R.  R.,  139. 

Howell,  Clark,  editor  of  Atlanta 
Constitution,  81. 

Huntington,  Collis  P.,  71. 

Indians,  at  Hampton  Institute, 
41-42. 

Jamestown,  1-2. 

Jones,  Judge  George,  114. 

"Learning  with  the  Hands,"  108. 
"  Library,  "  Washington's  first,  17. 


145 


146 


INDEX 


Library,  Carnegie,  72. 
Lincoln,  President,  7,  118. 
London,    Washington's    visit    to, 
124. 

Mackie,  Mary  F.,  24,  77. 
McKinley,  President,   106,   113. 
Macon  County,  Ala.,  46,  48,  90. 
Madison,  Wis.,  speech  at,  77. 
Maiden,  W.  Va.,  9-10,  12,  14,  17, 

29,  34,  37,  126. 
"Man  Farthest  Down,"  127. 
Marriages,  Washington's,  65,  131- 

132. 

Master  of  Arts  decree,  82. 
Morgan,  S.  Griffitts,  28. 
Mother,  Washington's,  3,  10,  30. 
Moton,  R.  R.,  successor  to  Wash- 
ington, 139. 
Murray,  Margaret,  132. 
"My  Larger  Education,"   108. 

Name,  Washington's  change  of,  9. 

National  Council  of  Congrega- 
tional Churches,  142. 

Negro,  15,  18,  22,  37,  41,  56,  59- 
60,  77-78,  80,  82,  85,  106,  108- 
110,  126. 

Negro  Bar  Association,  no. 

Negro  Business  League,  National, 
109. 

Negro  Funeral  Directors'  Associ- 
ation, no. 

Negro  Press  Association,  no. 

New  Haven,  Conn.,  142. 

Newspapers,  contributions  to,  107. 

Night  school,  35,  43. 

Paris,  Washington's  visit  to,  123. 

Peabody  Fund,  75. 

"Plucky  Class,"  43. 

Politics,     Washington's     interest 

in,  38. 
Porter  Hall,  62,  68. 

"Quarters,  "3. 

Rogers,  H.  H.,  71,  91,  138. 
Roosevelt,  President,  113-115. 
Rosenwald,  Julius,  74. 
Ruffner,  General  Lewis,  16. 
Ruffner,  Mrs.,  16-17. 


School,  first,  taught  by  Wash- 
ington, 34. 

vScott,  Emmett  J.,  114. 

Shaw,  Robert  Gould,  85. 

Slater  Fund,  75. 

Smith,  Fannie  M.,  65. 

South,  condition  of,  after  the 
Civil  War,  22. 

Stanley,  Sir  Henry  M.,  124. 

Storv-teller,  Washington  as  a, 
84-85. 

vStudents,  first,  at  Tuskegee,  49- 
50. 

Students'  work  at  Tuskegee,  61. 

Taft,  President,  115. 

Tanner,  Henry  O.,  123. 

Tuskegee,  town  of,  46,  143. 

Tuskegee  Institute:  beginnings  of, 
46-47;  Carnegie  Library  at,  72; 
character  of  students  of,  49- 
50;  commencement  exercises  of, 
93-94;  extension  work  of,  100; 
first  buildings  of,  50-5 1 ;  first 
year  of,  54-55;  growth  of,  ior; 
laying  corner  stone  of,  59-60; 
negro  conferences  at,  no;  open- 
ing of,  49. 

"Up  from  Slavery,"  108. 

Vessel,   unloading,   in  Richmond, 

19- 

Virginia,  1,  14. 

Washington,  Booker  T.,  Atlanta 
speech,  78-82;  birth,  3;  books 
by,  108;  character  of,  vii-viii, 
134;  children  of,  131;  coal  mine 
experiences,  12;  commencement 
speaker,  32;  contributor  to 
press,  108;  death  of,  143;  early 
life  of,  4-6;  education,  his  ideas 
of,  60-61,  91-93,  98,  103; 
"examination"  at  Hampton, 
25;  founds  Tuskegee,  46-51; 
home  life,  129-134;  hotel  waiter, 
employed  as,  34;  janitor,  works 
as,  26-27,  20;  journey  to  Hamp- 
ton, 17-18;  last  illness  of, 
142;  leader  of  race,  82,  105; 
league,  organizer  of,  109;  life  at 


INDEX 


147 


Hampton,  27-30;  marriages 
of,  65,  131-132;  Master  of  Arts 
degree,  82;  names  himself,  11- 
12;  orator,  makes  a  reputation 
as,  70,  76,  82-86;  personal  ap- 
pearance, 80;  politics,  takes  an 
interest  in,  112,  115-116;  raising 
money,  67;  service,  his  ideas  of, 
88-89;  Shaw  Monument  speech, 
85;    story-teller,    as    a,    84-85; 


teacher    at    Hampton,   40,    44; 

teacher  at  Maiden,  34;  trips  to 

Europe,       1 19-128;     vacations, 

while  a  student,  29-30. 
Washington,  Booker  T.  Jr.,  131. 
Washington,  Davidson,  131. 
Washington,  John,  5,  35. 
Washington,  Portia,  66. 
Wayland  Seminary,  36. 
Wheeling,  West  Virginia,  37. 


